European Union – Policies for a Better Environment

Environmental protection is part of the most important EU policy areas, and enjoys theconstant support of the public opinion. The main objectives of this article are the presentation of thehistory and goals of this policy, the ‘Prevention’ and the ‘Polluter pay’ principle, and Europeanlegislation regarding the waste, air and water quality. Finally there are presented a set of solutions thatwe consider useful in the context of twenty-first century. A qualitative approach was used, and themain methods employed are the observation, and a case study about the frauds that recently began toappear in EU, namely the stealing in the trading system of carbon dioxide emission rights (which alsoaffected Romania).