Fridays for Future Estonia vs. Environmental Board (Oil Shale Mining Case)

In May 2024, the Estonian Environmental Board issued an integrated permit to the new state-owned Enefit280-2 shale oil plant, allowing it to operate until the end of 2034. Following the Supreme Court ruling in Fridays for Future Estonia (MTÜ Loodusvõlu) vs. Eesti Energia regarding the construction permit issued to the same plant (see here), Fridays for Future Estonia filed another claim in June 2024 to stop the operation of the plant. There are two claimants in the case: MTÜ Loodusvõlu, the legally registered NGO of Fridays for Future Estonia, and Elo-Lee Maran, a young activist in the movement. The claimants argue that the Environmental Board should have refused to issue an integrated permit to the plant, because operating the plant causes carbon emissions, thereby hindering the achievement of the targets set out in the Paris Agreement and the National Energy and Climate Plan. Estonia has a national emission reduction target set for 2035 and to meet this, the Board issued the permit with a deadline, allowing the plant to operate until the end of 2034. However, the plant would increase Estonia’s yearly greenhouse gas emissions by about 6%, therefore diminishing Estonia’s share of the global carbon budget. The plant’s emissions would also hinder the achievement of the emission reduction target set out in the National Energy and Climate Plan 2030 in 2019, whereby Estonia should reduce its emissions by 70% (or to about 10.5 million tons) by 2030 compared to 1990. Additionally, MTÜ Loodusvõlu claims that the Board should have assessed the cumulative environmental impact of mining oil shale and producing oil from it. Overlooking the cumulative impact on nearby affected Natura 2000 areas constitutes a violation of the EU Habitats Directive. Furthermore, Elo-Lee Maran argues that, by aggravating the climate crisis, the operation of the plant violates her right to a healthy environment, as stipulated in national as well as international law. She also argues that the Environmental Board overlooked its obligation, stemming from the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, to set her best interests first when deciding on the permit. The Board did not pay any attention to the fact that worsening the consequences of climate change and depleting the ever-smaller carbon budget, which would require Estonia to limit people’s basic freedoms intensely in the future to limit climate change, are not in the best interests of a child. In February 2025, Tallinn Administrative Court dismissed the case. The Court ruled that MTÜ Loodusvõlu had legal standing as an environmental NGO, except for bringing human rights arguments, because these fall beyond their statutory aim of environmental protection. The Court found that the individual applicant did not have standing, as climate change does not affect her gravely enough. The Court’s main reasoning was the following. In the Court’s view, the oil plant does not stop Estonia from meeting its existing GHG reduction targets and the 2030 target is no longer in force, thus irrelevant. The operation of the plant is in line with national strategic development documents and there is no legal act that explicitly prohibits the operation of the plan. According to the judgement, the Board did not have to examine upstream environmental impacts caused by mining oil shale or downstream emissions from the combustion of the oil. In any case, even if the operation of the plant caused an environmental hazard, the annullation of the permit would have to be balanced against the severe restrictions on the freedom to engage in enterprise that such decision would cause to the operator. Based on these reasons, the Court found the decision to issue the integrated environmental permit to be lawful. The applicants appealed the case. In June 2025, their appeal was heard by the Tallinn Circuit Court. Subsequently, the announcement of the judgement has been postponed and is currently scheduled for the 28th of January, 2026. In October 2025, the Court resumed its consideration of the case to hear the parties’ views on the 28.10.2025 ruling by the European Court of Human Rights in the case of Greenpeace Nordic et al. v. Norway (no. 34068/21).