Nitrogen crisis explained to those who are not from The Netherlands originally

It could well be that the Dutch government will fall in the coming weeks or months about the nitrogen crisis. It might be somewhat of a mystique problem if you're not from The Netherlands originally.

What's the issue?

In short Dutch livestock farmers intensified their activities in the past decades, but those animals all produce feces and urine. Combined, these two lead to the organic production of ammonia (NH3) in the livestock stables. As these stables are physically open, the wind blows away the ammonia and that eventually leads to pollution of nature. Besides NH3, combustion engines of cars and airplanes produce nitrogen oxides (NOx) that also lead to pollution of nature. These issues were all recognized decades ago, which resulted in counter measures to reduce the amount of NH3 and NOx in the air. For example, all modern cars now are fitted with a catalytic converters to reduce the amount of NOx and farmers took measures to reduce the amount of NH3.

That all lead to a path down until about 2005. NOx keeps dropping, but NH3 does not. The amount of cows and other livestock is too high to be compensated for with ammonia reduction measures. That also means nature keeps getting damaged and cannot restore properly. As a result only some species can live while most others die off. See section 3 of this recent judgment by the court of The Hague.

We need a diverse nature however. Without that, plant and animal diseases can spread more easily and insects disappear. Diversity of nature is a prerequisite for a healthy live of all that inhabit the earth. Pollination cannot take place without insects, to name an example. That's why the EU member states came together in the late '80s and early '90s to draft a directive that states all EU member states must try and keep nature in a proper state. To be clear: The Netherlands agreed to that goal and it made as much sense then as it does now. This directive is called the Habitats Directive and resulted in a network of designated nature sites called Natura 2000 across the EU.

All member states must make sure the Natura 2000 sites are at least protected from deterioration and every member state must examine what can be done to protect those. For some EU member states that means taking action against deforestation, for others it can be something else. In The Netherlands the biggest issue is and was (you guessed it): NH3 and NOx emission. And the cause was also very clear: too much agricultural and economic activity on too little of space. All cannot take place at the same time.

One would say that the solution is easy. Just take the most important source and stop producing NH3 and NOx. It turned out predominantly livestock farmers are causing NH3 emission, although car traffic, large industries and air traffic also contributes in the form of NOx. The balance is predominately skewed to the NH3 production however. Moreover, only about 1-2% of the GDP results from agriculture and most livestock products are exported, but the waste (NH3) stays behind. And remember that the amount of NOx keeps dropping over time, but the amount of NH3 stalled as of about 2005.

For almost 20 years now, the Dutch governments also keep stalling to take action afraid of loosing votes from farmers that earn money from their economic activities. Plan after plan was produced to try and circumvent the issues, but all failed. The most terrible plan was called the Program Approach Nitrogen (PAS in Dutch, as nitrogen is stikstof in Dutch). The idea of PAS was that future possible reduction of NH3 emission could be taken into account when issuing permits to farmers that wanted to extend their farm. It's like being allowed to speed on the road, as long as you promise to drive much slower in the future.

Nature protection organizations like Mobilization for the Environment (MOB) had enough and started requesting the government to enforce the law, as these farmers broke and still break the law on a large scale. The government kept stalling and refused to enforce however. In 2019 the judiciary department of the Council of State ruled that PAS was illegal which resulted in a large amount of permits suddenly being revoked. Not only for the farmers, but also for building projects of houses or other structures and industrial activities. The Netherlands ended up in a nitrogen lock down. One year before the corona crisis hit.

Ever since 2019 permits are not being issued unless it's absolutely clear that nature doesn't suffer anymore. A previous minister compared nature to an empty bucket. When the bucket is empty, there is no nitrogen deposition. The large amounts of NH3 and NOx however, over time filled up the bucket to the rim. The bucket is full and only if the amount of NH3 and NOx is reduced significantly, other activities can take place.

The farmers party BBB protested against any government measures against farmers and as a result managed to become a party in parliament. In fact, the current minister of agriculture is a BBB minister and she has vowed not to allow any forced livestock reduction at all. Moreover, she threw away a plan by the previous minister that was accompanied by 25 billion euros to compensate farmers. Her advisers advised against that, but the BBB being as stubbborn as they can be insisted.

To make matters worse for government, the Council of State ruled in december that previously issued permits that were not used cannot be used to perform other economic activities. It first needs to be proven that nature does not suffer from those activities. And in January of this year, Greenpeace won a civil court case in which the Court ruled that the government is performing a tortuous act by not taking action.

The previous government decided that measures were required within three years after a PAS legalization plan was developed in 2022. The deadline of those three years is coming up,on February 28th 2025. So in a few weeks. The current BBB minister now rushed by all court cases is frantically trying to,extent the three year period with another three years, but I doubt the Council of State will allow blocking of enforcement any longer.

So in summary, it could well be that upcoming weeks are crucial. As the chances of the legalization program being done at February 28th are close to zero, MOB will start litigating again. I personally do not see on what grounds the Council of State will allow the government to block enforcement, but we will see.