Μake us preferred on Google Greece’s Environment and Energy Ministry has announced a €6.4 million funding call to rehabilitate six inactive illegal dumpsites on Greek islands, addressing a longstanding environmental problem that continues to generate European Union court penalties.
The initiative covers Mykonos, Tinos, Sifnos, Patmos, Paxos and Kalymnos, according to the ministry’s Oct. 12 announcement. The respective municipalities will be the beneficiaries.
All six sites have secured environmental permits for rehabilitation following months of cooperation between the municipalities and the ministry’s General Secretariat for Waste Management Coordination.
Although the announcement refers to funding their “closure,” the ministry says the dumpsites are no longer operating. The outstanding work concerns their environmental rehabilitation. Ending waste disposal at a site and cleaning it up are separate steps.
The ministry says completing the projects would eliminate €480,000 in annual fines associated with these six sites. It did not announce a completion deadline, a funding breakdown by island or details of the rehabilitation works.
A Problem Dating Back More than Two Decades
Greece’s illegal dumpsites have been the subject of EU court proceedings for more than 20 years.
On Dec. 2, 2014, the Court of Justice of the European Union imposed a €10 million lump-sum fine on Greece for failing to comply with a 2005 judgment concerning its obligations under EU waste legislation. The court also ordered recurring penalties, designed to decrease as illegal disposal sites were closed and rehabilitated.
The latest funding would therefore address part of an existing compliance problem.
According to Secretary-General for Waste Management Coordination Manolis Grafakos, the number of cases attracting penalties has fallen from 65 to 17. Completing the six island projects would remove six of those remaining cases, leaving 11 if there are no other changes.
Environmental Protection and Tourism
The ministry says the rehabilitation will protect residents’ health, improve sensitive island ecosystems and strengthen the destinations’ tourism offering.
The broader environmental stakes extend beyond tourism. EU landfill legislation seeks to prevent or reduce harm to surface water, groundwater, soil, air and human health. The announcement, however, does not identify specific contamination findings at the six sites.
Environment and Energy Minister Stavros Papastavrou described the projects as evidence of the government’s determination to resolve environmental problems inherited from the past.
Grafakos said the funding would help turn the affected sites into clean natural spaces while relieving taxpayers of recurring penalties.
Those benefits remain dependent on the projects being completed. The announcement confirms funding preparations and environmental permits, rather than finished restoration.
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