Article 203. Environmental Requirements Applicable to Operation of Industrial, Energy, Transport and Communication, Agricultural and Soil Improvement Facilities

1. Industrial, energy, transport and communication, agricultural and land improvement facilities shall be operated subject to environmental requirements and by using environmentally sound technologies, required treatment facilities and sanitary protection zones, which would preclude environment pollution. When operating the above facilities, low-waste and non-waste technologies shall be applied to ensure environmental safety.

2. Individuals and legal entities must take a set of measures to protect soil, water bodies, forests and other plant and wildlife against hazardous impact caused by agricultural operations.

Article 204. Environmental Requirements Applicable to Production and Operation of Motor and Other Vehicles

Individuals and legal entities that operate motor and other vehicles, which cause negative environmental impact, shall observe the permissible emission standards and take measures to reduce noise pollution level and other negative environmental impact.

Article 205. Environmental Requirements Applicable to Location of Nuclear, Heat and Hydro Power Plants

1. Placing and construction of nuclear power plants shall be carried out only if a project and an affirmative statement of opinion of state environmental and sanitary-epidemiological reviews are available. Nuclear power plant projects shall contain approaches ensuring their safe decommissioning, as well as waste recycling measures.

At locating, project design and construction of nuclear power plants, measures shall be taken to ensure radiological safety in compliance with law of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

2. In order to limit hazardous impact caused by heat power plants over the air condition in the adjacent area, prior to their location, emission levels shall be set by establishing benchmarks for each energy entity (and each pollution source) - in grammes per second – and annual emission levels (tonnes per year), which would ensure environmental safety of heat power plants.

Determining benchmarks (in grammes per second) and developing relevant measures shall be based on the designed maximum capacity of HPP equipment (with account of scheduled repair works and deactivation).

3. At locating, project design and construction of hydro power plants, real electricity demand of appropriate regions shall be ascertained, as well as seismic peculiarities and relief of the terrain in order to locate facilities and take measures to preserve land and forests, to provide for efficient protection of vegetation and wildlife and in general to preclude material negative environmental changes.

4. For power plants being designed and constructed, environmental emission levels should be complied with by the time of their commissioning. .

Article 206. Environmental Requirements Applicable to Military and Defence Facilities and Military Activities

Environmental requirements as set out in this Code shall apply to military and defence facilities and military activities, except for specific situations stipulated by law of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

Article 207. Environmental Requirements Applicable to Nature Resource Use

1. Environmental requirements applicable to use of land, subsoil, water, forest resources, other plant and wildlife shall be defined by this Code and other laws and regulations of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

2. There shall be prohibited business and other activities, which cause disturbance of natural environmental systems, destruction of genetic pool of living organisms, other environmental changes that are hazardous for human life and health.

Chapter 31. Environmental Requirements Applicable to Land Use

Article 208. Environmental Requirements Applicable to Changes in Intended Use and Recategorising Land

Land development project and other documents supporting the change of the intended use and transfer of land from one category to another shall be examined by the governmental environmental review.

Article 209. Environmental Requirements Applicable upon Zoning and Use of Agricultural Land

1. When zoning and using agricultural land, environmental safety and quality condition of agricultural land shall be ensured.

2. Agricultural land zoning shall be based on indicators of environmental adverse conditions, their criteria being physical degradation and chemical pollution.

3. The level of land pollution with chemicals shall be determined by reference to maximum permissible concentrations of chemicals in soil prescribed by the environment protection authority and agencies in charge of sanitary and epidemiological well-being of the population.

4. In order to determine the necessity to transfer land from more valuable to a less valuable category, its conservation, and to attribute land to environmental disaster areas or environmental emergency areas, environmental criteria of land evaluation shall be approved by the Government of the Republic of Kazakhstan (hereinafter, the “environmental criteria of land evaluation”).

Article 210. Environmental Requirements Applicable upon Zoning and Use of Land in Populated Areas

1. Land in populated areas shall be zoned in accordance with the environmental criteria of land evaluation.

2. When attributing land in populated areas to other categories, a potential transfer of pollutants into the air and water in these areas and their direct impact on human health shall be taken into consideration.

3. A special use mode shall be established for environmental emergency areas, which would prevent further deterioration of environmental condition.

Article 211. Environmental Requirements Applicable upon Zoning and Use of Land in Industry, Transport, Communication, Defence and Other Non-Agricultural Sectors

1. When zoning land in industry, transport, communication, defence and other non-agricultural sectors, environmental safety and land conservation and rational use shall be ensured.

2. To ensure human safety and create necessary conditions for operating industrial, transport and other facilities, zones shall be established and specific conditions of such land use shall be created to provide for environmental improvement.

3. When attributing land in industry, transport, communication, defence and other non-agricultural sectors to other categories, zones, where activities that do not comply with the zoning purposes are constrained or prohibited, shall be taken into account,.

4. An additional environmental criteria when attributing land in industry, transport, communication, defence and other non-agricultural sectors to other categories shall be its chemical pollution exceeding the concentrations determined by the environmental criteria of land evaluation. The land attributed to the top pollution category shall be closed down and categorised as reserve land.

Article 212. Environmental Requirements Applicable to Use of Land of Specially Protected Natural Areas and Recreational Land

1. A mode of using land within specially protected natural areas shall be regulated by the Land Code of Kazakhstan and the Law of the Republic of Kazakhstan On Specially Protected Natural Areas.

2. In order to preserve favourable environmental and sanitary and epidemiological conditions within the recreational land, sanitary protection zones shall be established during zoning.

Article 213. Environmental Requirements Applicable to Use of Forest Land Resources

1. A mode of using forest land resources shall be regulated by the Land and Forest Codes of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

2. Environmental criteria to attribute land to forest reserves shall be vegetation condition as an indicator of environmental condition within the area.

3. Agricultural land found within forests that are not used for forest needs can be attributed to agricultural land category in compliance with the forest legislation of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

4. Transfer of forest land reserves to other category shall be allowed provided only that an affirmative statement of opinion of the state environmental review is issued in accordance with the requirements of the forest legislation of the Republic of Kazakhstan and based on the forestry management and land management data in the following instances:

1) when land cannot be used in accordance with its former intended use;

2) when boundaries of the populated area have been changed;

3) when community boundaries have been changed; and

4) when land has been rated as land of specially protected natural area.

5. When forest land reserves are recategorised as any other category, environmental indicators that reflect land impact of the land quality on grass and tree vegetation in accordance with the environmental criteria of land evaluation shall be taken into consideration.