The complainant asked the European Commission to grant public access to documents related to the applications of mineral extraction and processing projects to be recognised as ‘strategic projects’ under the Critical Raw Materials Act. The Commission refused access, arguing that it could be generally presumed that disclosure of most of the documents would undermine the commercial interests of the companies concerned. As a result, the Commission did not individually assess most of the documents for possible disclosure.

Among other elements, the complainant contended that there was an overriding public interest in disclosure, given that the documents are likely to contain important environmental information.

The Ombudsman found that it was unreasonable for the Commission to apply a general presumption of non-disclosure to the documents. In addition, based on an inspection of the documents, she found that they do not contain sensitive information throughout, including because large parts of them had already been published when the Commission issued its final position on the complainant’s access request. The Ombudsman also noted that the documents contain extensive environmental information, including ‘information related to emissions into the environment’ for which an overriding public interest in disclosure exists.

As a result, the Ombudsman concluded that the Commission’s refusal to give public access constituted maladministration. She recommended that the Commission re-consider its position and grant wide access to the documents at issue.