Elsevier

Water Policy

Volume 3, Issue 2, June 2001, Pages 125-142
Water Policy

The EU water framework directive: measures and implications

https://doi.org/10.1016/S1366-7017(01)00007-1Get rights and content

Abstract

The new EU water framework directive is concisely and critically presented. The directive institutionalises ecosystem-based objectives and planning processes at the level of the hydrographic basin as the basis for water resource management. Whereas fulfillment of the ultimate objective of a “good” overall quality of all waters is questionable in terms of the high costs entailed and the lack of adequate legal enforceability, the directive will transform water institutions and planning processes, generate information and ensure no further deterioration of waters. The directive, affecting 27 countries, marks an important trend towards an ecosystem-based approach for water policy and water resource management.

Introduction

In the early hours of the morning of the 30th of June 2000, the European Parliament's (EP) and Council's conciliation committee reached a final agreement on the proposed Framework Directive for Community action in the field of Water (WFD). This culminated a 12-year-long policy process which started with the Water Policy Ministerial Seminar in Frankfurt in 1988, stumbled for years with the proposal of a directive on the ecological quality of water in 1993 (later removed), and revived with a Commission Communication in 1996 on “European Community Policy” and finally emerged as the proposal for the WFD in 1997. After three and a half years of institutional negotiations on the proposal and a near collapse in a conciliation procedure between the Council and the EP, the directive was finally approved albeit with considerable changes in its initial content.

Water is the sector with the most comprehensive coverage in EU environmental regulation. EU water directives have effected considerable changes in national legislative statutes even in the countries with the most developed environmental regulation. The WFD sets common approaches and goals for the management of water in 27 countries (15 Member State (MS) countries and the 12 pre-accession countries which should conform in the long term with Community law). In this respect the recent changes in EU water policy marked with the WFD will have important overall implications in shaping developments in water policy and management at an international level.

Water has been a cornerstone of EU environmental policy. Water directives characterise the different phases of environmental policy evolution, from an emphasis on public health protection to environmental protection per se, and from “end-of-pipe” solutions to preventative and integrated management approaches. The WFD marks the beginning of a new era in EU environmental policy and also sets a precedent for the long debated balance between MS “subsidiarity” and uniform standards at European level.

A prime objective of the present paper is to present clearly, concisely and in an organised manner the new WFD and its measures (Section 3) as well as the provisions where criticism has focussed (Section 4). Then the prospects of implementation with respect to the potential costs and the “enforceability” of the directive are addressed in Section 5. This will require first an adequate understanding of the policy context; a historical overview of EU water policy and an analysis of the driving forces of the WFD will take place in Section 2. The paper will conclude with an identification of the wider implications of the directive in terms of trends in water policy.

This paper complements the analysis of Kallis and Nijkamp (2000) on the evolution of EU water policy which puts more emphasis on the history and politics of EU water policy and less on the content and implications of the WFD and provides a slightly more optimistic perspective on the prospects of the WFD than that of Lichtenstein (1998) who termed the directive as the “fall of an integrated EU water policy”. Research for the paper is based on the work of the authors for the European Parliament and the study “New technologies and cost of water in view of the water framework directive” (STOA, 2000) and included a number of interviews with Commission, Parliament and Member State officials as well as with a number of organisations and individuals active in EU water policy.

Section snippets

The policy context—EU water policy in time

EU environmental and water policy can be roughly divided into three periods. The first period includes the first three environmental programmes (1973–1986). In this period the EC had no mandate for environmental regulation but only in areas affecting the core objectives of the Community. Environmental directives in this early period rested thus on the principles of “public health protection” and “harmonisation of environmental rules to avoid market distortion”. The Commission gradually

The water framework directive (WFD)

The WFD sets new goals for the condition of Europe's water and introduces new means and processes for achieving them. The overall goal is a “good” and non-deteriorating “status” for all waters (surface, underground and coastal). The means is organisation and planning at a hydrologic (river basin) level and implementation of a number of pollution-control measures, if necessary on top of those demanded by existing legislation that regulates water quality and pollution. A more detailed

Issues of concern

The provisions for hazardous substances regulation and groundwater protection were two of the main contested issues crystallised during the conciliation negotiation between the EP and Council. Critics question the potential of the final agreed text to deliver. Moreover, criticism focuses also on the disjointed approach with respect to issues of water resource (“quantity”) management.

Costs, enforceability and the prospects of implementation

Intuitively, and without resorting to detailed data, the financial costs of achieving the goal of good status of all waters will be high. Moreover, the administrative demands that the directive raises in terms of organisation and monitoring may test severely the capacities of the less developed MS. On this ground, environmentalists argue, to an extent convincingly, that unless the directive had a real binding character (which apparently it has only to some extent), its application at the ground

Conclusions: wider policy implications

The WFD introduces new standards, criteria, institutions and processes for managing Europe's waters under an integrating ecosystem-based approach.

The directive provides an exemplary legal document that binds fragmented environmental (or natural resource) legislation (as is the case in many policy fields and countries of the world) together under common ecosystem-based criteria and planning processes.

The directive redefines wisely the role of the EU in the formulation of environmental policy. A

Acknowledgments

Part of the research for the present paper was carried out for a study commissioned by the STOA Unit of the European Parliament on “New technologies and cost of water in view of the water framework directive”. The contribution of Ms. Kate Mills in the preparation of the study and the conduct of the overall research was indispensable. The study also built on the constructive comments of Mr. Dick Holdsworth, director of the STOA unit and editor of the final report.

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