> Some of them deal with issues that need to be dealt with (geological studies, looking at vibrations, etc), many of them are there to help with the massive overregulation which means you need to produce a report that no species of frog or insect is going to be upset by your new infrastructure project.
The thing is, these regulations are all well-known, sometimes decades old. Here in Germany, we have "Machbarkeitsstudien" ("feasibility studies") for that reason - we first look for obvious issues before we make a final decision. Of course, sometimes stuff crops up that hasn't been foreseen (e.g. more WW2-era bombs than expected, something has not been spotted at the time of the initial study), but there is no excuse in not doing the due diligence before starting a new project.
Environmental protection is often abused as a scapegoat.
Where we have a massive issue is NIMBYism - citizens feel that projects have been ordered "par ordre mufti", i.e. decided without engaging the affected people, and obviously that is an incentive for those people to use all legal tools at their disposal to obstruct a project. Thankfully, since a few years it's become the norm to not do that any more and actively involve affected people and NGOs already during the planning phase or even before, so at least for future projects we can expect less destructive opposition.
The thing is, these regulations are all well-known, sometimes decades old. Here in Germany, we have "Machbarkeitsstudien" ("feasibility studies") for that reason - we first look for obvious issues before we make a final decision. Of course, sometimes stuff crops up that hasn't been foreseen (e.g. more WW2-era bombs than expected, something has not been spotted at the time of the initial study), but there is no excuse in not doing the due diligence before starting a new project.
Environmental protection is often abused as a scapegoat.
Where we have a massive issue is NIMBYism - citizens feel that projects have been ordered "par ordre mufti", i.e. decided without engaging the affected people, and obviously that is an incentive for those people to use all legal tools at their disposal to obstruct a project. Thankfully, since a few years it's become the norm to not do that any more and actively involve affected people and NGOs already during the planning phase or even before, so at least for future projects we can expect less destructive opposition.