Environmental Liability under Hungarian Law

In this article, we briefly address the issues of administrative and civil law liability from the perspective of environmental liability under Hungarian law.

1 General Basis of Liability

Anyone using the environment is liable for the impact (e.g. pollution) of its activities. There are four main types of liability: civil law, administrative, offense and criminal liability.

According to the Act on Environmental Protection, anyone using the environment shall:

(i) refrain from engaging in any activity posing imminent threat or causing damage to the environment, and shall cease any such activity;

(ii) notify the environmental authority without delay concerning any threat to the environment or environmental damage, and supply the information requested by the environmental authority and as specified in specific other legislation;