EU news
Pharmaceuticals in the Environment (PiE)
The European Commission finally published the public consultation on Pharmaceuticals in the Environment. The European Parliament working group ‘agriculture and water management’ which is part of the Intergroup EurEau support, provided the perfect framework to discuss the issue and gather all stakeholders’ feedback, as well as the necessary political input by MEP Dantin and MEP Liese on this important topic. To access the public consultation (to which EurEau will respond) and read more about the meeting, read the ‘EU matters’ blog here.

DG SANTE plan on chlorate
Our expert Eric Chauveheid attended a meeting of the Biocides Competent Authorities on behalf of EurEau at the end of November.

Microplastics 
Anders Finnson, Arne Haar, Susanne Tumlin and Bertrand Vallet attended the microplastics conference co-organised by IWA Sweden, Sweden Water Research, Swedish Agency for Marine and Water Management and Svenskt Vatten on 8 November.

Glyphosate
Member States voted on 27 November the renewal of the glyphosate license in Europe for five years. Germany voted in favour, instead of abstaining as they did it before, and allowed to have a qualified majority for the renewal. It is the end of the story, at least for another few years…

EU urged to tighten controls on pharma pollution
Medical and environmental groups have called on the European Commission to propose specific legislation to address the threat posed by pharmaceutical products when it presents a strategy paper early next year.
In the joint letter, addressed to the EU Commissioner Karmenu Vella, the groups call for action to minimise the entry of pharmaceuticals into the environment throughout their lifecycle, applying a zero discharge policy, and argued that extended producer responsibility should be applied to the pharmaceutical sector.
We urged the EU executive in May to use an ongoing review of water quality legislation to align it with rules on pharmaceuticals and other chemicals.
The Commission is due to publish its communication on a ‘strategic approach to pharmaceuticals in the environment’ in the first quarter of next year.

Plant Protection Products – public consultation
The European Commission launched the survey concerning the REFIT evaluation of the pesticides legislation (Plant Protection Products): the PPP Regulation and the MRLs Regulation. The consultation is made up of a survey for stakeholders (deadline 31 December 2017) and a survey for the general public (deadline 12 February 2018). The consultants working for the Commission, ECORYS, are aware that EurEau’s experts are available for follow-up interviews

Nitrates Directive
A EurEau delegation, headed by EurEau Vice President Claudia Castell-Exner met the Unit of DG ENV responsible for the Nitrates Directive. The meeting was a great occasion to make the European Commission aware of the challenges posed to water resources and drinking water operators by nitrate.

Drinking Water Directive
The DWD is scheduled to be adopted by the College of Commissioners on 16 January 2018. In the past month, EurEau shared its views with the Commission on the various policy options under consideration and especially on the importance of strengthening Article 10 of the current DWD on materials and products in contact with drinking water. 

Materials and products in contact with Drinking Water 
EurEau and European Drinking Water met representatives of three Commissioners on 23 November to discuss the issue of materials and products in contact with drinking water, advocating for EU-wide hygienic requirements for these products under the DWD.

Bathing water parameters: DG ENV holds stakeholder consultation meeting 
On 24 November, Member states and stakeholders discuss possible changes to bathing water quality parameters as proposed by the WHO on behalf of the European Commission. The results of this sudy will feed into the formal review process of the Bathing Water Directive (2006/7/EC) to be launched in 2020.

Critical infrastructures: Member States meet with stakeholders
On 20 November, DG HOME hosted a meeting of Member States and critical infrastructure stakeholders to discuss strategies to mitigate security threats. Oliver presented the situation of the water sector.
DG HOME is launching the review process of the directive on European Critical Infrastructures (2008/114/EC) which is part of the European Programme for European Critical Infrastructure Protection (EPCIP). EurEau will assess the impact of a potential inclusion of the water sector in the scope of Directive 2008/114/EC.

Public sector information directive: Commission considers wider scope
DG CNECT will hold a high-level meeting on 23 January 2018 to discuss the potential extension of the scope of the Directive on the reuse of public sector information (2003/98/EC, PSI directive).
Bodies that are not purely public (e.g. entities providing services in the utilities sectors based on public procurement or concession contracts and/or subsidies from the state) are not covered today. This might change in the revised directive expected for spring 2018. EurEau is requested to provide three participants that can report on the situation in their company.

Water Framework Directive and Floods Directive– Roadmap feedback 
The EurEau Joint Working Group WFD drafted the response to the Commission’s roadmap on the WFD and FD, published in October. Our feedback is available here. All 82 feedbacks received by the Commission are available via this link. 

Water Framework Directive: Meeting of the Strategic Coordination Group
Carla and Oliver attended the Strategic Coordination Group meeting of the Common Implementation Strategy (8-9 November). Participants were updated on water-related legislative developments and the cooperation between DG ENV and DG AGRI.
All meeting documents are available here.

Anti-microbial resistance (AMR): European Antibiotics Awareness Day
The 10thEuropean Antibiotics Awareness Day took place on 15 November with calls for a more prudent use and increased investments in new products.
The European One Health Action Plan will also analyse the impact of antibiotics in the environment on AMR.

CAP: Commission publishes Communication on the future CAP
DG AGRI published its Communication COM(2017)713 The Future of Food and Farming. It fails to clearly address nitrate and pesticides pollution of water bodies. EurEau will react to this publication.

Effect-Based Methods (EBM) task under the WG Chemicals in the framework of the WFD CIS.
Armelle Hebert attended the kick off meeting of the Effect-Based Methods task under the WG Chemicals in the framework of the WFD CIS. You can find a note on this meeting here.

Kick off meeting of the WATenERgy Cycle
Caroline atteneded the first meeting of the WATenERgy CYCLE project in Larissa, Greece, on 7-8 November. The goals of the project include making the most of integrated water supply management in the Balkan region. The project aims at increasing resource efficiency and climate change resilience measures. 

SDG6 and the SME UNION
Carla spoke on behalf of EurEau at the work dinner held in the European Parliament, hosted by MEP Paul Rubig and organised by the SME Union. It was a very good opportunity to show the participants our work on the SDGs, especially after our Bilbao Congress meeting.   

The Bulgarian Presidency of the Council of the European Union
Bertrand and Carla met the attachés of the Bulgarian Permanent Representation to the EU to discuss the plans on of Bulgaria for the rotating presidency of the Council of the EU (January-June 2018) concerning water.

International water issues 
Carla attended a meeting organised by DG ENV on international water issues on the 8 November. The European Commission reported on the EU’s progress on cooperation with China, India and Iran, considered strategic partners, on SDG6.    

Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive evaluation roadmap
The Commission launched the review process of the UWWTD by publishing a roadmap (link). We sent our comments on the roadmap. You can read them here.
The fitness check should be finalised by the end of 2018.

Water reuse
Iacovos Papaiacovou, our Cypriot GA member, replaced Pier Paolo Abis for DG ENV’s ad-hoc Task Group meeting on water reuse held in Larnaca, Cyprus on 6-7 November to convey EurEau’s message. From our information, the proposal has been resubmitted to the scrutiny board and a decision on the release should be taken by the end of the year.

Monitoring inland and coastal water quality from space 
EOMORES is an EU co-funded project aiming to develop commercial services for monitoring the quality of inland and coastal water bodies using data from Earth Observation satellites.  The EOMORES project is inviting expressions of interest from new users.
If you represent a European water management authority, research institute or private company involved in water quality and would like to apply to test the initial EOMORES services, please write to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. (applications will be assessed on case-by-case basis).

INBO survey on ecological compensation on watercourse - Experience feedback
INBO and IOWater are conducting a survey, with the French Agency for Biodiversity (AFB) participation, looking, in Europe and internationally, for case studies and projects addressing ecological compensation on watercourses.

EurEau communications
EurEau in the media
Radio Bilbao broadcast from our Congress. They also made a short video to support this, discussing sustainability and cost recovery. Can you spot yourself in the clip? It is in Spanish!

Bertrand presents the outcomes of our Data Survey in this article in Pan European Networks. In it, he discusses the need for greater investment in the sector.