Environmental taxes: revenue level and who paid the most
In Ukraine, as in the entire civilized world, enterprises must pay a tax for polluting the environment. The more harmful emissions into the atmosphere or water, the higher the tax. "Slovo i Dilo" investigated the dynamics of environmental tax revenues in Ukraine in 2016-2020, and also found out which enterprises paid the most by region.
Environmental tax — is a nationwide mandatory payment by enterprises for environmental pollution. The tax is calculated from the actual volumes of harmful emissions into the atmosphere or water bodies, as well as from the volume of radioactive waste.
In total, from January 1 to October 31, 2020, Ukraine paid 3 billion 510 million 657 thousand 410 UAH in environmental taxes. This is the lowest amount in the last four years. The largest payments were in 2019, when enterprises paid 5.5 billion UAH. In previous years, payments ranged from 4.4 to 4.7 billion UAH.
For air emissions Ukrainian enterprises have to transfer the largest sums. However, these payments decreased every year. If in 2016 air polluters paid 3 billion UAH, then for the next two years in a row payments amounted to 2.4 billion each. A slight increase in payments occurred in 2019 - up to 2.5 billion UAH, and from January to October 2020 payments amounted to 1.4 billion UAH.
Over four years, the indicators of environmental tax payments for water pollution remained unchanged, amounting to 0.1 billion UAH annually.
Taxes for waste disposal in 2016 amounted to 0.8 billion UAH, the following year - 0.9 billion, in 2018 they increased to 1.1 billion, but the following year decreased to 1 billion UAH. By October 2020, 0.7 billion UAH had been paid.
A similar situation with payments for the formation or temporary storage of radioactive waste: in 2016 - UAH 0.8 billion, UAH 1 billion for the next two years, in 2019 - UAH 1.1 billion, and as of October 2020 - UAH 0.6 billion.
For the last two years, enterprises have also been paying for carbon dioxide emissions into the air. In 2019, the budget received UAH 0.8 billion, for 10 months of this year - UAH 0.7 billion.
Also, "Slovo i Dilo" looked at which enterprises are included in the top 10 payers of environmental taxes in Ukraine in January-October 2020.
The largest payment was made by SE "NAEC "Energoatom" - UAH 601 million or 17.1% of the total amount of environmental taxes paid in Ukraine.
The second place is occupied by JSC "DTEK Zakhidenergo", which paid UAH 379.6 million (10.8%). Next comes PJSC "Centrenergo" - UAH 338 million (9.7%).
Comparable payments were made by JSC "DTEK Dniproenergo", which paid UAH 262.1 million in environmental taxes (7.5%) and PJSC "ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih" - UAH 249.9 million (7.1%).
LLC "DTEK Skhidenergo" paid UAH 183.3 million in environmental taxes (5.2%).
Almost the same amount was contributed by PJSC "Donbasenergo" - UAH 129.7 million (3.7%) and PrJSC "MMK named after Illich" - UAH 123.7 million (3.5%).
The top ten largest polluters and largest payers of environmental taxes are closed by PrJSC "PivnGZK", which paid UAH 107.1 million (3.1%) for 10 months of 2020, and PrJSC "Poltava Mining and Processing Plant" - UAH 88.7 million (2.5%).
It should be noted that, according to the budget allocation, 55% of eco-taxes are credited to the state budget, and 45% to the special fund of local budgets.
Analysts from "Slovo i Dilo" looked at which enterprises paid the largest eco-taxes in each region.
Kyiv became the absolute record holder, where enterprises transferred a total of UAH 1 billion 267 million 700 thousand in eco-taxes from January to October 2020, of which 47.4% accounted for SE "NAEK "Energoatom" (UAH 601 million).
It is interesting to note, for comparison, that in Vinnytsia region, such an enterprise was LLC "Vinnytsia Poultry Farm", which paid almost 20% of all eco-taxes in 10 months of the current year, which amounts to UAH 3.4 million in monetary terms. In total, eco-taxes in the region amounted to UAH 17.4 million.
In Dnipropetrovsk region, air and water polluters paid UAH 614.8 million, of which the largest amount was paid by PJSC "ArcelorMittal Kryvyi Rih" (UAH 249.9 million or 40.7%).
Donetsk region (excluding occupied territories) received UAH 439.7 million in eco-payments, of which LLC "DTEK Skhidenergo" paid UAH 183.3 million (41.7%).
In Lviv region, polluting enterprises transferred a total of UAH 400.6 million, with the largest contribution from JSC "DTEK Zakhidenergo" - UAH 379.6 million or 94.8% of total payments.
Zakarpattia region received the least eco-taxes - UAH 1.8 million. Vinohradivske VUJKH contributed a significant amount of UAH 300 thousand. Also, small volumes of eco-payments were recorded in Chernivtsi (UAH 2.4 million) and Volyn (UAH 8.2 million) regions, where local heat and power companies are the largest air polluters.