Water legislation
UWWTD:
ENVI vote declines full benefit of EPR
The European Parliament’s Environment (ENVI) Committee
voted (20.09.23) on amendments to the revision of the Urban Waste Water
Treatment Directive (UWWTD). The recast should allow water operators
across Europe to tackle remaining pollution sources, to better align with the
Sustainable Development Goals and the European Green Deal, enhance the
governance of the wastewater sector and facilitate access to sanitation. The vote
in the plenary is set for 5 October.
Read our reaction to the ENVI vote here
and the ENVI press release here.
Water and agriculture
Sustainable Use of Pesticides: Co-legislators
far from break-through
Discussions in the Council and Parliament on the Sustainable Use of Plant
Protection Products Regulation have not significantly progressed over the
summer. Both institutions are likely to substantially weaken the proposed
provisions on sensitive areas, thus lowering the protection of drinking water
resources.
The Parliament’s Environment committee currently plans to adopt its
report at the end of October while the plenary meeting is scheduled for the end
of November. Council hopes to adopt a common approach before the end of the
year.
Pesticides: EFSA/ECHA Guidance on
drinking water disinfection by-products
The European Food Safety Authority
has published its 'Guidance document (here)
on the impact
of water treatment processes on residues of active substances or their
metabolites in water abstracted for the production of drinking water'.
EurEau welcomes this publication which is the result
of years of efforts. The guidance proposes a decision tree to avoid that
drinking water treatment processes lead to the creation of hazardous compounds
from pesticides and biocides and their metabolites.
Soil Monitoring Law: Rapporteur appointed
Martin Hojsík
(Renew, SK) has been designated as Rapporteur for the Soil Monitoring and
Resilience Directive (aka, the Soil Monitoring Law) proposed by the Commission
in July. During an initial exchange of views in the Parliament’s ENVI
Committee, which leads the file, Hojsík said he would refer to the text as a
“Soil Health Law” to emphasise the need for more ambition.
Nutrients: EurEau signs joint letter urging
Commission to publish INMAP
EurEau has endorsed an open letter sent
by the European Environmental Bureau (EEB) to the European Commission Executive
Vice-President for the European Green Deal, Maroš Šefčovič (12 September),
calling on the Commission to publish its Integrated Nutrient Management Action
Plan (INMAP). More
…
Water and the environment
Environmental Quality Standards:
Parliament backs Polluter Pays Principle but endangers aquifer recharge
The European Parliament adopted its position on a new law amending environmental quality
standards (EQS) for surface water and groundwater, with amendments that
strengthen the Polluter Pays and
Control at Source Principles through an explicit hierarchy of measures. MEPs also chose to increase transparency for water services and citizens by
making pollutant inventories public for each river basin. More
Mercury Regulation: draft
published
The Commission has published the draft revised Regulation 2017/852 on Mercury.
Despite the delay,
EurEau welcomes the proposal to end the use of dental amalgam in January 2025. This ban is urgent as dental amalgam is the most important mercury source in our surface waters.
Read more here.
REACH: Commission
publishes amendment to Annex 17
The Commission has
published the amending Annex XVII to REACH as regards synthetic polymer
microparticles. You can find it here.
PFAS: First ECHA consultation on the
restriction of “forever chemicals’
The first ECHA consultation on the universal PFAS
restriction proposal closed on 25 September 2023 with more than 5,600
submissions received.
In its reaction, EurEau demonstrated the impacts
of PFAS contamination on water operators in terms of resource and water use,
energy consumption, circular economy and costs. Only a full and prompt ban can
prevent even more serious problems in the future.
All submissions will be here.
Water as an essential service
Concessions
Directive: Water exclusion assessed
With considerable delay, the Commission
published its evaluation report of the Concessions Directive (Directive 2014/23/EU),
including a chapter on the exclusion
of the water sector from its scope. Regarding the exclusion of
the water sector, the report states that
'the limited data from a handful of Member States does not allow for drawing
firm conclusions on the impact of the Directive on the broader water sector.'
The report, accompanied by a Staff Working
Document, is available here.
No follow-up measures are announced.
Polluter
Pays Principle: Commission kicks off work on Recommendation
The Commission
has conducted a public
consultation on
the application of this principle to EU and national environmental law. This
initiative will result in Commission recommendations, possibly in 2024.
EurEau
supports this initiative. The application of the Polluter Pays Principle is
enshrined in the EU Treaty and should therefore be consistently applied in all
EU law. However, as the EU Court of Auditors wrote in their report 12/2021, the
application remains patchy and insufficient, in particular for diffuse
pollution.
Our input to the consultation is here.
