Neighbourhood disputes
Neighbourhood disputes (also called imission disputes) are seen as one of the possible legal instruments applicable in favour of the environment. In fact, the neighbourhood environmental imissions are a private law version of environmental injunctions. However, as for the approved industrial facilities, their eligibility is lower than in “small” cases.
In the Czech Republic, legal disputes between private actors regarding environmental matters have often been based on the provisions protecting the rights of neighbours (or protection against imissions, as stipulated under § 1013 of the Civil Code). Here, the affected person may ask the court to order the owner to refrain from anything that would cause emissions, which are disproportionate to the local circumstances and substantially restrict the regular use of the tract of land. This provision can be theoretically used against a private operator of an industrial facility or against noise from a highway but its success is not very likely, all the more since the new Czech Civil Code of 2012 introduced an additional rule stipulating that if the emissions result from an operation by an enterprise or a similar facility that has been officially approved (permitted by an authority), a neighbour only has the right to compensation for harm in money, even where the harm was caused by circumstances which had not been taken into account during the official proceedings. This does not apply if the operation exceeds the extent to which it has been officially approved. This means that, due to the new Civil Code, there is no more injunction redress against approved facilities.
In Poland, the regulation of the neighbourhood imissions that has been traditionally used in environmental cases is covered by the Civil Code. It orders landowners to refrain from actions which could disrupt the use of neighbouring real estate beyond a normal level, arising from the social and economic purpose of the real estate and local conditions. This provision can cover positive nuisances to the environment, such as penetration of dust, gases, smells, pollutants, toxic substances, or forces such as tremors, noises, electromagnetic waves; or negative nuisances such as depriving the neighbours of access to daylight, sufficient aeration or a view. Nuisance-based claims are pursued in a standard civil procedure; an NGO may also sue on behalf of a third person on whom the nuisance is inflicted.