This environmental performance review shows that while Turkey's strong economic growth has been relatively decoupled from air emissions, energy use, waste generation, and water consumption, the country still faces many environmental challenges. Turkey's fast-growing energy demand continues to depend heavily on fossil fuels, particularly coal, and its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions have increased more than any other OECD member country over the past decade. Power sector and transport emissions of fine particulate matter create a serious health concern. In addition, more than 90 percent of Turkey's municipal waste is landfilled.
To address these increasing environmental pressures, Turkey needs to step up its transition towards greener growth. While the country has strengthened its institutional framework to address environmental challenges and substantially upgraded its environmental regulations, bringing them closer to European requirements, several key instruments such as strategic environmental assessments (SEAs) and integrated permitting are yet to be fully implemented and compliance monitoring needs to be strengthened. More progress is also called for in improving access to environmental information and implementing concrete adaptation efforts at the local level.
The electricity system in Turkey faces three challenges. First, demand for electricity is growing as economic growth brings increased energy usage. Second, as the electricity supply expands to keep pace with demand there is the need to ensure that electricity prices remain affordable.
The Coruh/Chorokhi river system is of great economic importance to both Turkey and Georgia because of its largely undeveloped but economically exploitable potential for hydropower.