L 178/66 Official Journal of the European Union 28.6.2013 DIRECTIVE 2013/30/EU OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 12 June 2013 on safety of offshore oil and gas operations and amending Directive 2004/35/EC (Text with EEA relevance) THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND THE COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN UNION, Having regard to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, and in particular Article 192(1) thereof, Having regard to the proposal from the European Commission, After transmission of the draft legislative act to the national parliaments, Having regard to the opinion of the European Economic and Social Committee ('), After consulting the Committee of the Regions, Acting in accordance with the ordinary legislative procedure (2), Whereas: (1) Article 191 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union establishes the objectives of preserving, protecting and improving the quality of the environment and the prudent and rational utilisation of natural resources. It creates an obligation for all Union action to be supported by a high level of protection based on the precautionary principle, and on the principles that preventive action needs to be taken, that environmental damage needs as a matter of priority to be rectified at source and that the polluter must pay. The objective of this Directive is to reduce as far as possible the occurrence of major accidents relating to offshore oil and gas operations and to limit their consequences, thus increasing the protection of the marine environment and coastal economies against pollution, establishing minimum conditions for safe offshore exploration and exploitation of oil and gas and limiting possible disruptions to Union indigenous energy production, and to improve the response mech- anisms in case of an accident. () O] C 143, 22.5.2012, p. 125. (®) Position of the European Parliament of 21 May 2013 (not yet published in the Official Journal) and decision of the Council of 10 June 2013. G) This Directive should apply not only to future offshore oil and gas installations and operations but, subject to transitional arrangements, also to existing installations. Major accidents relating to offshore oil and gas oper- ations are likely to have devastating and irreversible consequences on the marine and coastal environment as well as significant negative impacts on coastal econ- omies. Accidents relating to offshore oil and gas operations, in particular the accident in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, have raised public awareness of the risks involved in offshore oil and gas operations and have prompted a review of policies aimed at ensuring the safety of such operations. The Commission launched a review of offshore oil and gas operations and expressed its initial views on the safety thereof in its Communication ‘Facing the challenge of the safety of offshore oil and gas activ- ities’ on 13 October 2010. The European Parliament adopted resolutions on the topic on 7 October 2010 and 13 September 2011. Energy Ministers of the Member States expressed their views in the Conclusions of the Council of 3 December 2010. The risks relating to major offshore oil or gas accidents are significant. By reducing the risk of pollution of offshore waters, this Directive should therefore contribute to ensuring the protection of the marine environment and in particular to achieving or maintaining good envi- ronmental status by 2020 at the latest, an objective set out in Directive 2008/56/EC of the European Parliament and the Council of 17 June 2008 establishing a framework for community action in the field of marine environmental policy (Marine Strategy Framework Direc- tive) (3). Directive 2008/56/EC aims to address, as one of its central purposes, the cumulative impacts from all activities on the marine environment, and is the environ- mental pillar of the Integrated Maritime Policy. That policy is relevant to offshore oil and gas operations as it requires the linking of particular concerns from each economic sector with the general aim of ensuring a comprehensive understanding of the oceans, seas and coastal areas, with the objective of developing a coherent approach to the seas taking into account all economic, environmental and social aspects through the use of maritime spatial planning and marine knowledge. () O] L 164, 25.6.2008, p. 19.