Resources - Position papers

Directive 2022/0344 amends the Water Framework Directive (WFD) and its two daughter directives, the Groundwater Directive (GWD) and the Environmental Quality Standards Directive (EQSD).

The proposal adds pesticides, pharmaceuticals and PFAS to the priority substances lists for surface water and groundwater, and sets more flexible procedures to update Environmental Quality Standards (EQS).

EurEau welcomes the enlargement of the EQS lists as a prerequisite to providing safe and affordable drinking water services to consumers and as an effective means of protecting the environment.

If EQS are exceeded, the EU and Member States are obliged to take action to curb the emissions. EurEau requests that, in line with Article 191.2 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), any exceedance of EQS should primarily trigger control-at-source measures.

EurEau welcomes the European Commission’s Proposal for a Directive concerning urban wastewater treatment (recast) as its more ambitious objectives will align better with the overarching UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and the European Green Deal while enhancing the governance of the wastewater sector and people’s access to sanitation. Reaching the new goals and requirements as set out in the Proposal will require mainstreaming control at source, significant investments and time.
The purpose of this position paper is to identify the key topics within the Proposal which EurEau members see as the agenda to take forward through the
amendments process, aiming at enabling an effective and efficient implementation and achievement of the Proposal’s objectives.

EurEau supports major parts of the proposed Regulation, but calls for more clarity regarding ‘off-site transfer’ management. Easy access to data is paramount to facilitate the risk management of waste water operators.

Waste water treatment plants (WWTP) larger than 100,000 PE are covered by the Regulation as it was for the E-PRTR and the list of pollutants did not change. Some provisions are added regarding diffuse pollution, which is positive, but more details are needed in order for the Regulation to be correctly applied.

We welcome the legislative proposal of the Regulation on the Sustainable Use of Plant Protection Products (SUR), enshrining the European Commission’s Zero Pollution ambition in pesticides policy to protect human health and the environment. 

This legislative proposal heralds good news for water operators: water suppliers need water resources that are protected from pollution so that tap water remains safe and affordable, and the right to water is not jeopardised.

While the legislative proposal represents a major step in the right direction, we urge the European Parliament and the Council of the EU to embrace the change and support a European food system that protects water resources.

We regret, however, that Regulation (EC) No 1107/2009 on placing pesticides on the EU market will not be revised, since this legislation is key to restricting harmful pesticides. It must be ensured that only those substances that have no detrimental effects on human health, the environment, and more specifically, drinking water production, are allowed for use. This is not the case today. Furthermore, more attention should be paid to the possible combination effects of substances and regrettable substitutions of substances.

The proposed text meets most of the water service providers’ expectations by correcting some drawbacks of the current directive regarding the protection of water bodies. EurEau supports the general philosophy, aligned with the zero-pollution ambition, to control industrial pollution at the source. Overall, we find the Commission’s proposal goes in a very positive direction and we look forward to working with the EU institutions to make the IED an effective and robust force in protecting the environment, human health, water resources and water services’ workers.

Removing PFAS from the urban water cycle causes a wide range of problems for water service providers. While technologies exist to remove most PFAS, they are unsustainable, mainly due to their technical complexity, resource intensity (water, energy, treatment chemicals etc.) and the generation of PFAS-containing residues. Reliance on end-of-pipe solutions creates a substantial stumbling block on the water sector’s journey towards climate neutrality. Any emissions of chemicals belonging to this group into the environment need to be avoided, using the Precautionary Principle and the Control-at-Source Principle. This can be best achieved by an EU-level ban of all PFAS uses.

Although the Renewable Energy Directive (RED III) does not specifically address the water sector, the water cycle has renewable energy generation potential, i.e.: the generation of electricity from hydraulic turbines, biogas from sewage sludge, electricity and thermal energy from sewage sludge mono-incineration, electricity from on-site windmills and solar panels, heat pumps and thermal energy from waste water at several stages of the water cycle. Hence, the water sector substantially contributes to the renewable energy targets and climate policies.

EurEau supports the general objective of the Energy Efficiency Directive (EED) which is to promote energy efficiency next to using renewable energies with the overall goal to achieve energy and climate neutrality. The EED and the Renewable Energy Directive (RED) must accompany and support this process, taking into account the GHG emissions as the main indicator.

Waste water treatment plants (WWTP) remove pollutants from domestic waste water through mechanical and chemical processes and the biological activity of the biomass contained in the reactors. Chemicals coming from industrial waste water discharges into sewers can pose threats to waste water treatment, human health and the environment.

Therefore, controlling hazardous industrial discharges into sewers is an essential measure for protecting the environment, for the effective and sustainable operation of WWTPs, and to allow operators to comply with the Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive (UWWTD). Any sustainable policy framework must start from the Precautionary Principle, the Control at Source Principle and the Polluter Pays Principle, according to Article 191.2 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU).

EurEau supports the setting of Environmental Quality Standards (EQS) for pharmaceuticals provided several pre-conditions are met to avoid that the water sector will be the first and/or only stakeholder to take the burden for ensuring compliance.

Enabling the circular economy for waste water services requires the alignment of a set of directives regulating the sector. The Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive (UWWTD), the Industrial Emission Directive (IED), the Waste Framework Directive (WFD) and the Sewage Sludge Directive (SSD) are key to the collection and treatment of urban waste water and subsequent treatment and re-use of urban waste water treatment sludge (UWWTS).

Small agglomerations have been identified as a source of pollution in the evaluation of the Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive (UWWTD). Despite that small agglomerations need to be better defined in the UWWTD, this source of pollution needs to be robustly addressed for the protection of biodiversity, ecosystems and for the protection of drinking water resources.

EurEau would like to see more guidance on monitoring and control of small or even individual systems at EU level through a thorough assessment and planning for the registration and monitoring of individual sanitation systems included in River Basin Management Plans. These elements should also be easily accessible to the local drinking water operators so that they can include them in the risk assessment and risk management of the catchment area as required in the recently recast Drinking Water Directive.

This paper explains the technical and practical implications for Urban Waste Water Treatment Plants (UWWTP) regarding the legal problems triggered by the Weser Ruling. It suggests possible solutions to look forward.

Statement on the Climate Action Technical Screening Criteria

The European waste water sector can make a big contribution to reaching climate neutrality objective by reducing Greenhouse Gas emissions and energy consumption. The revision of the Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive can create momentum to build a legal framework to address climate mitigation and the impact of waste water treatment plants. This paper presents how a tailor-made approach could generate the most optimal results.

The current directive is just being implemented, and so there is little or no experience as to how it functions in practice. Instead of revising, should the Commission focus on its effective implementation.

If the European legislators decide to proceed with the revision, they should focus on the further development of a coherent and streamlined regulatory framework for the security of network and information systems, without imposing additional and excessive burdens on industry.

At the same time, any duplication of legislation and inconsistencies with existing sector-specific and digital EU law should be avoided. The revision of the Directive should lead to a further strengthening of the preventive approach. This includes all aspects of detection and recovery by providing more and more detailed information on risks and incidents in the Member States, from national competent authorities to operators of essential services.

In the framework of new Commission policy work to protect public health and the environment, certain sectors, and in particular the chemical industry, are promoting a new ‘Innovation Principle’ next to the Precautionary Principle.

EurEau strongly supports innovation in our sector. However, we do not agree that the approach of BREFs as defined under the Industrial Emissions Directive (IED) suits the context of the UWWTD. Innovation and affordability of water services are best supported by an UWWTD which establishes output requirements with clear indications of enhanced performance requirements to achieve specific protection of the environment and public health, rather than prescribed instruments.

European waste water service providers see the revision of the 1991 Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive (UWWTD) as an opportunity to develop an ambitious, innovative, supportive and straight-forward new policy framework enabling operators to meet the Green Deal goals and make waste water collection, treatment and management fit for the decades to come.

New objectives to be delivered must consider the affordability of water services. This includes the long life-cycle of waste water collection and treatment assets and their inherent inflexibility for adaptation or upgrading.

The aim of this paper is to set our general expectations and point at areas to be covered by the impact assessment. Detailed positions or notes on specific topics will be delivered in due course.

Addressing the pollution of water resources in the context of the European Green Deal with its Zero Pollution Action Plan (ZPAP) is fundamental for the continued provision of safe and affordable drinking and waste water services, whose essential mission is to protect human health and the aquatic environment.

EurEau fully supports the zero pollution ambition and calls on the Commission to put water front and centre of the plan. Industry and agriculture have an important role to play in controlling pollution and rectifying environmental damage as much as possible at the source.

The action plan should propose concrete actions rather than focussing solely on establishing monitoring frameworks and promoting digital tools.