A document “Growth strategy of Lublin province between 2006 and 2020” is the basic instrument for the policy pursued by the province local government, the overriding purpose of which is to achieve lasting and sustainable social and economic growth of the region by improving competitiveness and also the optimal exploitation of its internal growth potentials.
The intrinsic features of its natural environment and its cultural landscape are among the region’s most important endogenous potentials and are its very strong feature, as well as offering a grand development opportunity. Implementing that task is one of the key elements of the strategy. Within the described framework an improvement of the state of the environment and the population’s ecological security is expected in the next few years, as well as strengthening sustainable foundations for the growth of the economy’s multifunctional character. The outcome should be for the province to improve its attraction and territorial cohesion in the spatial system both of Poland and Europe.

The primary planned items are: integrated and effective water management in river basins and an improved water balance by water storage (including the expansion and modernisation of the water supply infrastructure), improved water quality (including the construction and modernisation of sewage treatment plants and sewage removal systems), development and modernisation of integrated waste management (including supporting waste segregation, recycling and utilisation), implementing sustainable and multifunction land economy and management (including reclaiming degraded land and afforestation), supporting ecological agriculture, increasing the acreage of green areas on settlement and tourist land), finally protecting and maintaining the bio-diversity of the region and strengthening the system of protected areas (including introducing European nature protection systems and programmes, revitalisation and protection of unique natural and landscape features).

One of the programmes contained in the strategy is the “Programme to protect Lublin Province natural environment”, the principles of which comprise instructions to formulate ecological goals, guideline of activity and concrete ventures. An indisputable goal of the Province’s policy is to satisfy legal requirements concerning air quality and all standards of system emissions required by existing regulations. These include the need to fulfil undertakings in the Treaty of Accession concluded between Poland and the European Union, taking transitional periods into account (for emissions of carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxide and dust), connected with implementing directive 2001/80/WE on restricting emissions of certain pollutions into the air from large objects with energy-generating combustion.
An essential role in reaching air quality required by law will be played by implementation of air protection programmes for class C zones. To do that local authorities have to assume new duties as regards activities to ensure air quality improvement within the specified zones. There are four class-C zones in Lublin Province (2006 classification): (the cities of Lublin, Chełm, Zamość and Biała Podlaska) for which activities have to be taken called the “Air Protection Programme”.
2010 is the year for comprehensive introduction of directive 96/61/WE of the 24 September 1996 on the integrated prevention and restriction of impurities (IPPC Directive) and also to reach the defined ceilings of carbon dioxide and nitrogen oxides emission from all objects of energy-generating combustion. As regards Lublin Province, the innovative operations will be of major importance, undertaken primarily in such large local plants as “Pulawy” Nitrogen Works S.A. (planned operations – reconstruction of a steam boiler to adapt it to valid emission norms, construction of a system to remove sulphur from gases emitted by the thermal-electric power station, modernising the furnace to reduce N02 emission from the salt-heating preheaters on the Melamine I system, constructing a system to reduce nitrogen suboxide in the Ammonia Saltpeter Department and also an adapted system, to cooperate with a monitoring system, preparing a JI project for NO2 reduction, drawing up the concept of a system for joint combustion of biomass in energy generating boilers) and also Lublin-Wrotków thermal-electricity power station Co. Ltd. (planned operations: building a gas-fuelled power unit with a coal gasification system (IGCC of 280 MW, building a hard-coal fuelled power unit KWK Bogdanka in a high-efficiency technology of supercritical parameters of 2x800 MW generating electricity and heat in the thermal-electric power station, based on biomass and an alternative fuel).
Moreover, the greater use of renewable energy in the region’s economy will be of major importance for its air protection by a comprehensive approach to improving energy generation effectiveness, as regards renewable sources of energy, including their promotion on a wide scale. Lublin local government is also planning to support air protection investments pursued by businesses and also activities to restrict low emissions from communal sources. The local government will also soon be promoting solutions in transportation systems allowing emissions to be avoided or reduced (e.g. by introducing buses meeting Euro 4 and Euro 5 norms to the urban transport fleet) supporting investments which serve manufacturing and using biofuels as well as educating the local population as regards ecology concerning needs and possibilities of air protection, including saving energy and using renewable sources of energy