By ratifying the Aarhus Convention in 2005, the European Union (EU) took upon itself the obligation to ensure that members of thepublic have access to administrative or judicial procedures to challenge acts and omissions by EU institutions which contraveneprovisions of EU law relating to the environment. This study asks whether the EU has complied with its obligations on access to justice arising from the provisions of the Aarhus Convention. Then, it examines the judicial and administrative procedures currentlyavailable to private individuals and organisations under EU law for the review of the acts and omissions of EU institutions andbodies, and the relevant case-law of the Court of Justice of the European Communities (ECJ) and its Court of First Instance to comply with the requirements of the Aarhus Convention. The study shows that the EU has a major problem of noncompliance with its obligations under Article 9(3) of the Aarhus Convention.
