support to the fitness check of wfd and fd€¦ · risks for (sub) river basins with significant...

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Support to the Fitness Check of

WFD and FD

Third Stakeholder Workshop

3 June 2019

2

Opening address

Hans Stienstra, Deputy Head of Unit, Clean Water, DG

Environment

Agenda item 1

3

An interactive workshop

Agenda Item 2

1. Throughout the day, ask questions and send comments

to the presenters via the Sli.Do application.

2. We’ll have polling and voting after each evaluation

criterion – your opportunities for participating!

Your platform? Visit:

https://app2.sli.do/event/dw5pzhy6

Let’s try this first!

An interactive workshop today!

4 Wood

https://app2.sli.do/event/dw5pzhy6

5

Methodology, state of play of EU water policy and

definition of the baselineAgenda Item 3

• Reminder on methodology.

• State of play of water policy.

• Definition of the baseline.

Overview

6 Wood

Reminder on the methodology

7

• Water Framework Directive, Environmental Quality

Standards Directive, Groundwater Directive and Floods

Directive.

• Application of the Better Regulation Guidelines

methodology.

• To be used by DG Environment as an input to the ‘Fitness

Check’ document.

• Final stages, comments from the workshop will be taken

into account.

Scope of the Support to the Fitness Check

8 Wood

Intervention

logic

Evaluation

questions

Information

collection

Analysis and

preliminary

conclusions

Validation

Overview of process

9 Wood

Intervention logic

10 Wood

Evaluation questions

11 Wood

Effectiveness

1. To what extent are the Directives performing as expected?

2. Which main factors have contributed to or stood in the way of achieving the Directives’ objectives (including flexibility of the Directives)?

3. Have the Directives led to any unexpected significant changes, either positive or negative?

Efficiency

1. What are the costs and benefits of the legislation and to what extent are the costs of the legislation justified, given the benefits achieved?

2. To what extent do the costs and benefits vary between Member States or regions?

3. What factors have influenced the efficiency, and can good practices be identified?

4. To what extent are there opportunities to simplify the legislation or reduce unnecessary regulatory cost without undermining the objectives of the Directives?

5. To what extent are monitoring and reporting requirements fit for purpose?

Coherence

1. To what extent is the legislation coherent internally?

2. To what extent is the legislation coherent with wider EU policy?

3. To what extent is the legislation coherent with international obligations?

Relevance

1. How well adapted are the Directives to take into account technical and scientific progress? Have they been adapted based on this progress?

2. To what extent are the objectives still relevant and properly addressing the key problem that ecosystems and society presently face? (the adverse consequences of floods & insufficient water status of (selected) water bodies in the EU as needed for sustainable, balanced and equitable water use)?

EU added value

1. What is the additional value resulting from these Directives compared to what could have reasonably been expected from Member States acting at national, regional and/or international level?

2. To what extent do the issues covered by the Directives still require action at EU level?

Data collection techniques

12 A presentation by Wood.

Literature review

• Objective:

Identify and

use relevant

information

already

existing

• When: August

- November

2018

• What: More

than 200

sources

screened and

reviewed

Online public

consultation

• Objective:

Gather

feedback from

a range of

stakeholders

on issues

related to the

Fitness Check.

• When:

September -

March 2019

• What: More

than 380,000

responses,

demonstrating

the important

and interest of

the general

public for the

topic

Targeted

stakeholder

survey

• Objective: Gather

specific feedback

from experts on

a wide range of

issues.

• A series of 10

specific

questionnaires.

• When: March

2019

• What: More than

200 responses

from experts

involved in the

implementation

of the legislation

and covering all

Member States

Targeted

interviews

• Objective: One

to one

discussion with

experts to

gather views

on specific

topics.

• When: March –

May 2019

• What: 77

expert

approached

including

members of

the Strategic

Committee

Group.

Targeted focus

groups

• Objective:

Gather and

discuss

selected topics

with a small

number of

experts

• When: March-

April 2019

• What:

• Floods

Directive

• Groundwater

Directive

• Information

on costs and

benefits

exchanged

Stakeholder

workshops

• Objective:

Validate initial

conclusions

with a wider

range of

stakeholders,

fill remaining

gaps through

three 1-day

workshops

• When: October

2018 - June

2019

• What: more

than 100

stakeholders

attended

workshops so

far.

• Effectiveness: Overall good level of evidence. A large part of the evidence is from literature available (Implementation reports and analysis from the EEA) and corroborated by stakeholders’ feedback.

• Efficiency: Overall low level of evidence. Case study approach to demonstrate range of information available. Challenge to extrapolate an EU wide view with regards to costs and benefits. Inherent variability of starting point in Member States, and challenges on gathering evidence for the baseline.

• Coherence: Overall good level of evidence mostly from triangulated feedback from stakeholders. In many cases, what is described by stakeholders as incoherence is more a reflexion on implementation practices rather than legal incoherence or contradictions.

• Relevance: Overall high level of evidence in literature is high. The conclusions are supported by stakeholder opinions expressed in the OPC and targeted questionnaires that point to the same direction.

• EU Value Added: Robustness of findings is moderate, because of the inherent methodological difficulty of assessing EU Value Added against a hypothetical baseline from 20 and 14 years ago. Evidence on EU value added in literature was relatively modest, but findings from the surveys and interviews relatively detailed and complete.

Conclusions on robustness of the evidence gathered

13 Wood

State of play of water policies

14

• River basin approach.

• Introduction of ecological and hydro morphological

requirements.

• The WFD is also the first really ‘integrated’ Directive in the water

field. Integrated with respect to three aspects.

– integrated approach of surface water (both fresh water, and

transitional and coastal waters), groundwaters, protected areas

for drinking water, for economically significant aquatic species,

for recreational waters, nutrient-sensitive areas and areas

designated for protection of important habitats and/or species.

– It combines several directives that existed before the WFD

came into force, with new elements.

– Finally, in the Program of Measures, the WFD aims at

integrating and optimizing the measures for both water quality

and water quantity.

WFD and Daughter Directives – what was new?

15 Wood

– Directive 2008/105/EC established the first list of substances under the

WFD, including standards to be met. The Directive was updated in 2013.

– In 2006, the ‘Groundwater Directive’ (GWD) was published to

complement the WFD for groundwater quality and protection. It

spells out in particular, the list of relevant pollutants, threshold values

and contains provisions for assessing groundwater chemical status,

trend assessment of concentrations of pollutants, and measures to

prevent or limit inputs of pollutants into groundwater.

• Annexes I and II of the Groundwater Directive 2006/118/EC were

reviewed in 2014 (Commission Directive 2014/80/EU of 20 June 2014). The

review focused on the interpretation of chemical status, helped with the

harmonisation threshold values and natural background levels and initiated

the development of watch list.

Daughter Directives

16 Wood

• Overall the WFD has been transposed in all Member States.

• The latest implementation assessment reviewed the Second River Basin Management Plans.

• All Member States have approved their RBMPs, however there were delays in the plans being approved and delays in the data being submitted through the WISE platform.

• Between the first and the second reporting cycles only a limited number of water bodies have improved in status. This is explained by, inter alia, late identification of pressures, longer time required to design effective policy measures, the response time of nature before measures take effect, but also heightened quality standards and improved monitoring and reporting that reveals water bodies previously qualified to be in ‘unknown’ status to actually be ’unsatisfactory’.

• Substantial efforts have been made to implement the WFD.

State of play

17 Wood

• 40 % of the surface water bodies are in good or high

ecological status or potential, with lakes and coastal

waters having better status than rivers and transitional

waters.

• Since 2008 , there has been an improvement to the overall

understanding and knowledge regarding ecological status

S with the number of intercalibrated ecological

assessment methods increasing from c.10 to nearly 400.

• Proportion of water bodies with unknown ecological

status has reduced from 16% to 4%, and the confidence in

classification has improved.

State of play -surface water - Ecological status

18 Wood

• In 2nd RBMP - 38% of surface water bodies are in good

chemical status (by number of water bodies), while 46%

are not achieving good status and the status of 16% is

unknown.

• Ubiquitous substances are particularly problematic, for

example mercury. When removed from the considerations

only 3% of surface water bodies would fail to achieve

good status.

State of play -surface water - Chemical status

19 Wood

• For surface water and groundwater little improvement in

chemical status between first and second RBMPs.

• However, there has been a reduction in the number of

water bodies registered as unknown for the chemical

surface water.

State of play –surface water - Chemical status (2)

20 Wood

• Around 90 % of the area covered by groundwater bodies

is reported to be in good quantitative status.

• In some southern Member States of the EU, namely

Cyprus, Malta and Spain, there are significant problems

with the quantitative status of groundwater bodies. Issues

are also observed in northern EU Member States.

• The main pressures causing failure to achieve good

quantitative status are water abstractions for public water

supply, agriculture and industry.

State of play - Groundwater quantitative status

21 Wood

• Good chemical status has been achieved for 74 % of the

area covered by groundwater. Nitrate is the main

pollutant, affecting over 18% of the area covered by

groundwater bodies. In total, 160 pollutants resulted in

failure to achieve good chemical status. Most of these

were reported in only a few Member States, and only 15

pollutants were reported by five or more Member States.

• In the EU, agriculture is the main cause of groundwater's

failure to achieve good chemical status, as it leads to

diffuse pollution from nitrates and pesticides. Other

significant sources are waste water discharges that are not

connected to a sewerage treatment system, and

contaminated sites or abandoned industrial sites.

State of play – Groundwater chemical status

22 Wood

• For river basin districts located in more than one state, authorities have the obligation to coordinate the RBMPs if all states are EU member states.

• If some of the states are not EU-member states, an attempt needs to be made to coordinate the RBMPs.

• Given the transboundary character of water, this is an important aspect.

Transboundary cooperation

23 Wood

Floods Directive commenced in 2007.

– Five steps in each cycle of the FD, in three stages.

– First cycle completed with submission of FRMPs in

December 2015 (with implementation of FRMPs until

2021).

– Each MS has implemented the process, with one minor

caveat.

State of Play – Floods Directive


Stage 1: PFRAs

• PFRAs evaluate past flood events and evaluate if similar events (and their

related adverse impacts) could occur in the future. PFRAs can also include

predictive assessments if deemed necessary if, for example, a particular

aspect of flood risk assessment is prevalent.

• On the basis of PFRAs, Member States will identify Areas of Potential

Significant Flood Risk (APSFR), which are used to inform subsequent

management plans within the FD.

Stage 2: FHRMs

• FHRMs develop integrate the results from PFRAs in order to map flood

risks for (sub) river basins with significant risks of flooding.

• FHRMs show how far floods might extend, the depth or level of

floodwaters and the impacts they may inflict on human health, the

economy, environment and cultural heritage.

• Flood hazard maps should include data for three scenarios of flooding

(low, medium and high probability).



• Stage 3: FRMPs

FRMPs are plans for managing flood risk that define objectives

and identify a range of measures designed to achieve those

measures.



Baselines

27

• A baseline or counterfactual is required to evaluate the functioning of Directives and to compare the performance of the Directive against a point of reference.

• The effects of the Directives are the comparison between the current situation observed and the situation that would have been expected without the Directives.

• It will allow the identification of the extent to which positive and negative changes observed stem from the implementation of these Directives specifically rather than from other, pre-existing water policy measures or other developments.

• Where an impact assessment was conducted, the baseline reflected in these documents is adopted as the counterfactual.

Definition of the baseline

28 Wood

• No Impact Assessment is available on the WFD and distinguishing the

measures taken under the pre-WFD legislation and their impact represents a

significant challenge.

• The WFD reporting distinguishes between the basic measures required by the

legislation pre-dating WFD (baseline) and WFD specific basic measures.

Baseline – WFD 1

29 Wood

Basic measures pre-dating WFD (Art 11(3)a Basic measures under the WFD (Art 11(3)b-l

The Urban Waste-water Treatment Directive (91/271/EEC).

The Nitrates Directive (91/676/EEC).

The Sewage Sludge Directive (86/278/EEC).

The Drinking Water Directive (80/778/EEC) as amended by

Directive (98/83/EC).

The Bathing Water Directive (76/160/EEC).

The Integrated Pollution Prevention Control Directive

(96/61/EC).

The Major Accidents (Seveso) Directive (96/82/EC).

The Birds Directive (79/409/EEC)).

The Habitats Directive (92/43/EEC).

The Environmental Impact Assessment Directive

(85/337/EEC).

b) Measures to implement Article 9 (cost recovery).

c) Measures to promote efficient and sustainable water use.

d) Measures to protect drinking water quality and reduce level

of treatment required.

e) Measures to control abstraction from surface and

groundwater.

f) Measures to control recharging of groundwater.

g) Measures to control point source discharges.

h) Measures to prevent or control inputs of diffuse pollutants.

i) Measures to address any other significant impacts on status,

in particular the hydromorphological condition.

j) Measures to prohibit direct discharges to groundwater.

k) Measures to eliminate or reduce pollution by Priority

Substances.

l) Measures to prevent accidental pollution.

• RBMPs developed by the Member States in the first cycle (2009-2015) were required to include the assessment of the status of surface and groundwater bodies as of 2009 as well as the assessment of the expected status in 2015 (as a result of implementation of planned measures and development of different pressures).

• While noting that the availability and quality of the analysis by Member States strongly differ in quality, this dataset represents the best available information on the state of aquatic environment across Europe at that time.

• Furthermore, reports on characterisation (2004) provide an overview on the state of water bodies across Member States.

• However, the Water Blueprint (2012) highlighted that the quality of the information provided by Member States in their RBMPs was not sufficiently clear to set a baseline for 2009 and assess how the status of EU waters is likely to evolve in the medium and long term.

Baseline – WFD 2

30 Wood

• In the absence of the GWD proposal the following limitations would continue:

– The WFD set a requirement to achieve good chemical status by 2015 but did not include indications on what constitute good chemical status for groundwater bodies. In the absence of the GWD, no common methodology on establishing thresholds for chemical status of groundwater would have been developed and implemented.

– The WFD required that all environmentally and statistically significant and sustained upward trends in concentrations of pollutants of groundwater should be reversed but it did not include a precise definition of a significant upward trend. In the absence of the GWD, confusion would persist regarding the interpretation of trend reversal principle leading to the lack of harmonised interpretation in different Member States.

– Groundwater quality was monitored differently in Member States, resulting in the lack of comparable monitoring data.

– In the absence of the GWD, there would be numerous derogation requests regarding the application of WFD environmental objectives to "historically" polluted sites. If such derogations were granted, many sites would be left as they are with no further measures required other than controls.

Baseline – GWD

31 Wood

• In the absence of the EQSD:

• New information on risks to environment and human health

– In the few Member States where proposed PS have already been designated as

RBSPs, there was considerable variation in terms of the magnitude of the

standard and the chosen matrix, meaning that without the harmonised EQS

derived for each substance as a PS, the situation would persist.

– In the absence of a proposal to list the possible new PS in the EQSD, the baseline

scenario would include almost no monitoring in the aquatic environment of

these substances.

• Specific challenges with ubiquitous persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic chemicals

– If there were no change, widespread pollution by some of the existing

ubiquitous PBTs could hide improvements achieved for other substances in the

second RBMP.

• Knowledge base (monitoring)

– In the absence of the proposal, the implementation of REACH and the PPP

Regulation of 2009 was likely to provide additional data, but neither was likely to

lead to the provision of targeted, EU-wide monitoring data relating to

emerging pollutants.

Baseline – EQSD

32 Wood

• In the absence of policy action (Floods Directive):

– The response to flood risks would largely remain disaster-driven and focused

on emergency response rather than on managing the risks before, during

and after a flood due to a lack of a strategy;

– The implementation of existing flood risk management plans could be

postponed due to decreased awareness and sense of urgency over time as

flood risks tend to be forgotten and not taken into account while making plans

in flood-prone areas;

– There would be no integrated approach across the river basin to reduce and

manage flood risks in an effective and coherent manner;

– Implementation of flood risk management and disaster relief measures would

not take into account the objectives set under the WFD.

• The Floods Directive aimed to reduce the risks to human health, the environment

and economic activity and introduced the following obligations:

– Preliminary flood risk assessment - to identify areas at significant risk.

– Flood risk mapping - to support the prioritisation of investments and actions.

– Flood risk management plans – to assess flood risk, define objectives and

deadlines, and identify and implement sustainable measures.

Baseline - Floods Directive

33 Wood

34

Analysis of the effectiveness

Agenda Item 4

Effectiveness - overview

Effectiveness - Overview


WFD and Daughter Directives

36

• Member States have implemented the Directive and

followed the required steps: characterisation, identification

of competent authorities, adoption of two cycles of River

Basin Management Plans, adoption and implementation

of the Programmes of Measures, etc.

Effectiveness – key findings WFD


Implementation of Programmes

of Measures

Adoption of River Basin

Management

Plans (2 cycles)

Identification of competent

authoritiesCharacterisation

• Two cycles of implementation of the WFD, the latest

results have been analysed by the European Commission

and the EEA.

• The key results are as follows:

Achieving good status (1)

38 Wood

Groundwater bodies Surface water bodies

• 74% of European groundwater bodies

have achieved good chemical status

• 89% of European groundwater bodies

have achieved good quantitative status

• 38% of SWB have achieved good

chemical status

• 40 % of the surface water bodies are

in good or high ecological status or

potential, with lakes and coastal

waters having better status than

rivers and transitional waters.

• MS have made progress achieving the objectives related

to groundwater bodies but the results are less

encouraging for surface water bodies.

• It is difficult to understand the scale of improvements

between the two reporting cycles, however there appears

to be limited deterioration of status, and an improvement

of the knowledge base.

• Overall improvement of the monitoring network and water

knowledge.

Achieving good status (2)

39 Wood

• There is a huge variation across the EU in monitoring

priority substances in surface water bodies; this holds for

the percentage of water bodies being monitored as well as

for the number of substances being monitored.

• About half of the water bodies in the EU are, in some way,

covered by an exemption as enabled in Article 4 of the

WFD. This demonstrates that achieving the environmental

objectives is considered a difficult task by the Member

States.

Remaining issues – surface water

40 Wood

• For chemical status, a number of groundwater bodies

either lack monitoring or only have monitoring for a

limited number of the core parameters.

• Threshold values (TV’s) for groundwater are implemented

by the MS differently.

• Many Member States need to continue improving

quantitative monitoring programme, and working towards

completing quantitative status assessment for all

groundwater bodies.

Remaining issues – groundwater

41 Wood

• Level of transboundary management across the EU when developing the second RBMPs was variable.

• For the largest rivers (e.g. the Danube and the Rhine) international commissions help deliver an integrated approach to water management, building on the efforts and input from individual (national) RB management planning processes.

• The WFD also steers bilateral cooperation between different countries. In cases when non-EU countries are involved, the level of collaboration may be weaker.

• Little collaboration outside of existing Commissions are found in relation to the 2nd RBMPs.

Facilitation of transboundary cooperation

42 Wood

• Positive perception of the WFD’s encouragement of

transboundary and international cooperation in the

context of integrated water management.

• For example, as part of the OPC, when stakeholders were

asked to provide an overall rating of the Directives

benefits, 63% of stakeholders indicated that improved

cooperation at transboundary/transnational level was a

moderate-very significant benefit of the WFD.

• 28% of OPC respondents indicated that international co-

operation to tackle pollution contributed towards a major

improvement to water quality when asked what actions

have had the most impact since the WFD was transposed.

Transboundary cooperation

43 Wood

• Improved transboundary cooperation by stimulating the

establishment of more recent transboundary basin

organisations (e.g. International Sava River Basin

Commission) and empowering the existing international

river Commissions (e.g. along the Rhine and Danube) by

providing a common legal framework.

• More could be done with regard to transboundary

cooperation.

Conclusions on transboundary cooperation

44 Wood

Factors that have contributed to the

Directives

Factors that have hindered the

achievements of the objectives of

Directives

• Common Implementation Strategy.

• Enforcement at EU level.

• Funding provided at EU level for

measures.

• Funding provided at EU level for

research.

• Integrated legislation and

requirements under other

legislation.

• Involvement of the public.

• Transboundary action.

• Use of exemptions.

• One out all out principle.

• Competing uses of water (e.g.

agriculture, domestic use, industry,

recreation, navigation and energy).

• Lack of political will to prioritise

water measures.

• Lack of funding to implement

measures.

Factors have contributed to or stood in the way of

achieving the Directives’ objectives?

45 Wood

• To assist Member States in this, and to harmonize the

approach across the EU where needed, the Common

Implementation Strategy (CIS) was set up.

• Several working groups were established (some of them

are still active) and one of their main tasks was to draft

Guidance Documents.

• These Guidance Documents, although not legally binding,

played an important role in the implementation of the

WFD.

Common Implementation Strategy

46 Wood

Common Implementation Strategy

47 Wood

• View from stakeholders that the CIS is covering the right issues either fully or to some extent.

• Feedback from stakeholders has consistently raised the importance of the CIS process in supporting the implementation and the understanding of the requirements of the Directives.

Views on topics covered by CIS

48 Wood

Yes, fully

1 0%

Yes, to a

large

extent

51 %

To some

extent

37%

No

2%

• Compliance promotion activities.

• Focus on working together with Member States on shared

implementation challenges .

• Formal legal action (pilots, infringements, court cases).

• Non-conformity actions.

Enforcement at EU level

49 Wood

• Range of funding instruments, Horizon, LIFE, European Rural Development Funds, Cohesion Funds etc.

FP7

keyword Water

– Number of Projects : 1,585

– EU Contribution to the Projects: €2.714.612.335

Keyword Monitoring

– Number of Projects: 205

– EU Contribution to the Projects: €520.155.090

H2020

keyword Water

– Number of Projects : 1,410

– EU Contribution to the Projects: €2.301.514.485

Keyword Monitoring

– Number of Projects: 150

– EU Contribution to the Projects: €325.714.287

Funding provided by the EU

50 Wood

• EEA report indicated that it might be presenting an overly

pessimistic view of the progress that has so far been

achieved.

• This is due to the fact that this principle means that the

worst status of the elements used in the assessment is the

one that determines the overall water body status. Hence,

it is likely that progress achieved in certain quality

elements could be hidden if a lack of progress is

shown in other elements

One out all out principle

51 Wood

• Intellectually the principle is mostly found to be sound and justified, however there are some criticisms to the way it is being used.

• Communication focusing on overall results masks progress at individual parameter level.

• No constraints or indication in the Directives on what the communication should be.


52 Wood

3

1 1

1 2

5

45

7

2

5

1

6

7

1 4

4

59

6

4

1 1

4

27

33

1

6

71

33

1 2

21

1

6

36

30

1 8

1 02

1 4

1 2

38

6

0% 1 0% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 1 00%

Academic/research institution

Business association

Company/business organisation

Consumer organisation

Environmental organisation

EU citizen

Non-governmental organisation (NGO)

Other

Public authority

Trade union

Agree to a large extent Agree to some extent

I do not agree I do not know

• Polarised views between those indicating the application

of the process is an actual barrier for the achievement of

the objectives and others finding it merely a challenge for

the communication of results.


53 Wood

3

11

12

5

45

7

2

5

1

6

7

14

4

59

6

4

11

4

27

33

1

6

71

33

12

21

1

6

36

30

18

102

14

12

38

6

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Academic/research institution

Business association

Company/business organisation

Consumer organisation

Environmental organisation

EU citizen

Non-governmental organisation (NGO)

Other

Public authority

Trade union

Agree to a large extent Agree to some extent I do not agree I do not know

• Exemptions foreseen in Article 4 of the WFD cover

around half of Europe’s water bodies, mostly concerning

natural water bodies, but also heavily modified and

artificial water bodies, next to new physical modifications.

• Justification for such exemptions have improved in the 2nd

RBMP assessment, but persistent use shows that

significant efforts are still required to achieve good status

or potential by 2027.

Use of exemptions

54 Wood

• Competing uses of water (e.g. agriculture, domestic use,

industry, recreation, navigation and energy).

• Lack of political will to prioritise water measures.

• Lack of funding to implement measures.

Other limitations to achievement of objectives

55 Wood

• A range of unintended effects have been identified by

stakeholders, these are either negative or positive, and it is

interesting to note that some are seen as both equally

negative and positive.

• For example, the fact that emission permitting is more

complicated due to the application of the EQS is seen

almost equally as being a negative and positive impact.

Unexpected significant changes, either positive or

negative, have the Directives led?

56 Wood

Views from stakeholders on unintended effects

57 Wood

425

205

243

308

194

130

141

110

111

36

172

33

33

112

96

52

121

171

180

170

227

118

150

334

171

124

279

294

187

171

204

230

242

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

More workers dealing with water management have environmental skills

There are fewer new houses and other buildings near rivers or the coast

Member State authorities are more cautious about issuing emissions permits tonew installations

Authorisations and extensions of permits for hydropower plants now integratethe requirements

Identification of contaminated groundwater has restricted land use in thoseareas

Member States have focused on restoring water bodies that are closest to beingin good status

The legal obligations to comply with biota Environmental Quality Standardshave complicated emissions permitting

Insurance premium for assets mapped as being at risk of flooding hassignificantly increased

The financial value of land in areas identified as being at risk of flooding hasfallen

Farmland has been converted to urban or industrial uses

The area of productive farmland has decreased due to water managementmeasures

Has happened (positive consequence) Has happened (negative consequence) Has not happened

Overall answer to main evaluation questions


To what extent is the Directive performing as expected?

• Formal framework for the implementation of the Directives has been established.

• Intermediary steps have been taken: characterisation, identification of competent

authorities, delimitation of river basins, setting monitoring networks.

• The results from the implementation reports and from the EEA 2018 assessment

indicate that the objectives of the WFD with regard to achievement of good status for

all EU waters have not yet been achieved.

• The WFD appears to have delivered to some extent on its objective of non-

deterioration of EU waters.

• The implementation of the WFD and Daughter Directives have resulted in a better

understanding of water in Europe and an improved knowledge base.

• While the provisions on transboundary cooperation have been transposed, more

could be done for these to lead to more effective collaborations over transboundary

river basins.



Which main factors have contributed to or stood in the way of achieving the Directives’

objectives?

• Several factors have been identified as contributing to the achievements of the

objectives observed so far, these include the Common Implementation Strategy

process, the compliance assurance programme from the European Commission with

enforcement and support activities and the funding provided to contribute to some of

the measures required.

• Other factors have hindered the achievements of the objectives of the Directives, in

particular the lack of funding for measures and the inherent competition for water uses.

• The level of effort needed to implement the Directives, including the technical

knowledge and the skills required might have been underestimated.



To what unexpected significant changes, either positive or negative, have the Directives led?

• A range of unintended effects have been identified by stakeholders, these are either

negative or positive, and it is interesting to note that some are seen as both equally

negative and positive.

• Overall a limited number of unintended negative effects have been identified which

suggest that the legislation was drafted suitably.

• The range of positive unintended effects, in particular concerning the increase in

ecological skills within non water competent authorities, and the ‘flagship’ role of the

WFD in establishing a European governance model suggest that benefits from the

legislation have been reaching further out than expected.

Floods Directive

61

Approach

1. Performance:

a) Outputs: implementation of 5-step process of the FD.

b) Outcomes: performance of flood risk management processes in MS,

including main contributing factors.

c) Impacts: changes in flood risk (stated purpose of the FD).

2. Key barriers and challenges to implementation.

3. Unexpected outcomes (positive and negative).

Process

– Initial findings developed from literature review.

– Key gaps explored in initial consultation (OPC, targeted survey).

– Tested these and filled further gaps in focus groups.

– Refined and challenged findings in interviews.

Introduction – Floods Directive Effectiveness


Outcomes: progress in implementation FD requirements

– Five steps in each cycle of the FD, in three stages.

– First cycle completed with submission of FRMPs in December 2015 (with implementation of

FRMPs until 2021).

– Each MS has implemented the process, with one minor caveat.

PFRAs:

– All MSs have completed PFRAs, using a range of criteria to define significant historical and

future floods.

– The majority of APSFRs are associated with fluvial flooding.

FHRMs:

– Fluvial flooding the most commonly mapped source.

– Groundwater flooding and flooding from artificial water-bearing infrastructure rarely reported.

– Incorporating pluvial flooding is considered by some to be a significant challenge.

Effectiveness of the Floods Directive - Outputs


Stage 3: FRMPs

• All MS have developed FRMPs for all UoMs (with one minor caveat).

• All but 2 MS reported the conclusions of their PFRAs and FHRMs in their FRMPs.

• All FRMPs included FRM objectives (some were not measurable and time-bound).

• Measures:

– 50% prevention and preparedness.

– 40% to protection from flood damage.

– 10% recovery.

• All MS reported on the prioritisation of their measures, with around 10% seen as critical

priority and 60% as very high or high priority.

• 60% of MS have taken climate change into account during the preparation of maps.

Effectiveness of the Floods Directive - Outputs


Stage 1: PFRAs

• Cultural heritage and environmental factors are less well considered.

• Only 33% of MS considered long-term socio-economic changes.

• Some aspects not often covered by PFRAs:

– Effectiveness of man-made flood defenses.

– Conveyance routes of historical floods.

– Geomorphological characteristics.

– Areas of economic activity.

Stage 2: FHRMs

• Cultural heritage impacts not widely reported.

• Information-sharing within river basins:

– 22% of MS did not share information as required.

– 7% presented unclear information.

– 15% indicated that they had not shared flood risk areas.

FD Outputs – implementation weaknesses


Stage 3: FRMPs

• For around half of MS, FRMP objectives neither quantitative or time-bound.

• Only 40% of MS linked objectives clearly to measures.

• Not all sources of flooding covered in FRMPs, often without explanation.

• Consultation processes are widely applied, yet the impacts are often unknown.

• Details of the costs of measures in FRMPs were variable and sometimes

lacking, as were identification of funding sources:

– 8 MS reported costs of each measure in FRMP.

– Many FRMPs make only generic reference to funding sources.

FD Outputs – implementation weaknesses


Outcomes: intermediate changes, such as to processes and procedures, not including changes on

the ground (impacts)

Key outcomes identified:

• Standardised best practice process for flood risk management across the EU.

– Formalised process of strategic planning.

– Designation of flood prone areas.

– Development of flood management plans.

– Diverse impact on legal systems: strong impact where frameworks previously lacking.

– Shift towards proactive risk-minimization, from reactive disaster response.

• Coordination and cooperation between sectors, organisations, decision makers and other

stakeholders has improved.

– MS: FD has contributed to coordination and development of flood risk management across the

EU.

– Stakeholders: FD has led to improved coordination between Member States, including sharing

of information and best practices.

– Coordination between the EC and MS could still be improved.

• Reporting requirements of the FD have led to better data availability:

– Greater transparency of data outputs requested by stakeholders.

• MS: modelling suggests flood risk reduction, but no data yet to prove/disprove.

• Greater public awareness but challenges incorporating consultation into FD outputs.

Effectiveness of the Floods Directive - Outcomes


Targeted survey question: What do you think are the key benefits of implementing the Directive?

Key benefits identified by respondents:

– avoided damage.

– improved information and better decisions.

– climate change adaptation.

– transboundary cooperation.

Effectiveness of the Floods Directive - Outcomes


6

21

6

1 4

1 0

8

1 9

6

2

2

6

7

2

3

4

5

1 0

1 1

4

1 6

1 4

1 5

1 3

1 2

1 0

1 4

24

1 0

8

1 1

6

2

9

3

1

4

0

2

4

2

7

2

7

7

1 0

3

2

3

2

3

2

1

1

4

3

0

1

5

4

1

0 5 1 0 1 5 20 25 30 35 40

Social benefits

Avoided damage

Sustainable water use

Standardised terms and approaches

Enhanced transboundary cooperation

Enhanced cross-sectoral cooperation

Improved information, better decisions

Public information and consultation

Enhanced use of economic instruments

Enhanced innovation

Climate change mitigation

Climate change adaptation

Enhanced ecosystem resilience

Enhanced ecosystem services

Ecosystem protection

Very significant Moderately significant Slightly significant Not significant Do not know

“Impacts”: changes to flood risk in MS, and reduction of adverse consequences for human health,

the environment, cultural heritage and economic activity associated with floods

• Usually a focus on impacts in an evaluation.

• However, FRMPs in place since only December 2015.

• Accepted by all MS and key stakeholders that impacts do not yet exist, because:

– Most measures in FRMPs are not yet in place.

– Assessing a change in flood damages requires many years of data across many

flood events.

• So, expert opinion and modelling about whether the expected impacts of the FD are

likely to be achieved:

– Unanimous support from Floods Focus Group participants that the FD will

achieve its objectives.

– Modelling shows reduced flood risk from FRMP implementation – for example,

Irish FRMP reports 95% of at-risk properties in 300 communities can be protected

by proposed measures.

– Strong support from relevant private sector stakeholders on the process and its

implementation.

Effectiveness of the Floods Directive - Impacts


• Funding

– Majority of MS report funding has increased partly or strongly since 2007.

– Funding streams considered more consistent due to FD requirements.

– Funding identified as key barrier by MS in focus group, with technical barriers (linked).

– Many MS provide insufficient information about funding sources in FRMPs.

– Funding for cross-border investments is limited.

• Mapping of pluvial flooding

– Including pluvial flooding considered a key challenge to successful implementation by MS.

– Very few (6) MS included pluvial-sourced floods in flood mapping.

Effectiveness of the Floods Directive – barriers and

shortcomings


0 3 6 9 1 2 1 5 1 8 21 24 27

Fluvial flooding

Pluvial flooding

Pluvial flooding with other relevant sources

Sea water flooding

Groundwater flooding

Floods from artificial water bearing infrastructure

• Challenges associated with pluvial flooding:

– High resource costs (particularly in PFRAs and APSFRs).

– Low data availability.

– High number of variables required for mapping.

• Quantitative assessment underpinning FRMP measure selection:

– Limited use of CBA in FRMPs (11 MS for all UoM, 5 MS for some UoM).

– 12 MS provided clear description of CBA methodology used.

– Costs of flood measures provided by ~50% of MS (not for all FRMPs or measures).


shortcomings


0

2

4

6

8

1 0

1 2

For all UoMs For some UoMs Alternative Unclear

• Standardized definitions of key terms and concepts:

– Further assistance requested by MS (e.g. ‘flood’, ‘significant’, climate change scenarios, and

APSFRs).

– Facilitates information sharing.

– Assists the consistent implementation of FRM process.

– Assists stakeholders operating across MS.

– Facilitates transboundary outcomes.

– CIS process well placed to provide this.

• Green Infrastructure:

– Assessments have found green infrastructure lacking focus in most FRMPs.

– NWRMs included in most FRMPs, but some lacked details.

– Link with use of CBA: NWRMs provide multiple benefits, but not assessed in FRMPs.

– Linkages between FD and WFD could be improved.

– Reporting suggests that further opportunities for use of GI may exist.

• Climate change

– Incorporating climate change into FD outputs identified as a weaknesses of 1st cycle.

– However, detailed consideration of climate change only required in second cycle.

– Most MS undertook research on climate change and its impacts.

– Incorporation of climate change identified as key issue for 2nd cycle.


shortcomings


Other challenges identified by stakeholders:

• Land use planning:

– Land use planning coherence with FD identified as a challenge of FD implementation in some

reporting.

– Majority of respondents to targeted questionnaire reported FD was integrated with land use

planning ‘to some extent’ or ‘to a large extent’.

• Insurance:

– Low use of private insurance identified as a weakness by some stakeholders.

– Member States adopt very different approaches to insurance.

– FD does not require insurance be provided.


shortcomings




To what extent is the Directive performing as expected?

• The framework for assessment and management of flood risk required by the FD has been

successfully implemented by MS (with some minor caveats).

• The process is highly supported by competent authorities and key stakeholders, who consider the

process to be appropriate and implementation to be largely successful.

• Nevertheless, implementation has not been perfect. Some identified shortcomings in performance

include:

• Uneven consideration of climate change by MS.

• Knowledge of flood impact on cultural heritage and environmental assets.

• Objectives stated by MS in FRMPs are often not quantified or time-bound, with implications

for selection of measures.

• Uneven reported use of CBA to inform selection of measures in FRMPs a weakness.

• Greater potential for cost-effective use of NBS in FRMPs than has been identified to date by

MS.

• These are largely implementation challenges, rather than structural weaknesses.



Which main factors have contributed to or stood in the way of the Directive’s objectives?

Main factors that have contributed to meeting the FD’s objectives:

• Flexibility: the FD requires the implementation of a risk management process, which can be flexibly

developed to reflect MS contexts.

• Structure: standardisation of the flood risk management process across MS has instituted a best

practice framework across the EU.

• CIS information-sharing forum and resources are widely credited by CAs as being a highly valuable

source of information for implementing the FD.

Key factors that have impeded the achievement of the FD’s objectives:

• Shortages of funding, both for implementing the process of the FD (such as data collection and

analysis), and implementing measures selected for FRMPs.

• Lack of technical skills in some MS, with which to implement the FD, particularly in expertise areas

such as pluvial flooding.

• Associated challenges in delivering some technical aspects of the process, such as incorporating

pluvial flood sources into mapping.



Have there been any unexpected impacts of the Directive?

• No identification of significant negative unintended consequences of the FD from MS, key

stakeholders or public.

• One positive unintended consequence identified: potential template for best practice

disaster management.

Live questions and polling

Agenda Item 5

77

78

Thematic discussion on interaction session results and

open issues related to Effectiveness Agenda Item 6

79

Presentation 2 by the project team on Efficiency

Agenda Item 7

• The aim of the analysis is to understand what are the costs and benefits of the Directives and to what extent the costs have been justified in light of the benefits achieved.

• The analysis also aims to explore any significant differences in costs or benefits between Member States, factors that have influenced the efficiency and opportunities to simplify the legislation and reduce unnecessary regulatory burden.

• Evaluation questions:

– EQ. 4 - What are the costs and benefits of the legislation and to what extent are the costs of the legislation justified in light of the benefits achieved?

– EQ. 5 - To what extent do the costs and benefits vary between Member States or regions? If there are differences, what is causing them?

– EQ. 6 - What factors have influenced the efficiency, and can good practices of efficient implementation of the Directive be identified?

– EQ.7 - Are there opportunities to simplify the legislation or reduce unnecessary regulatory cost without undermining the objectives of the Directives?

Efficiency analysis

80 Wood


81

• The total capital investment needed for Article 11(3)(a) measures (baseline measures) from 2016-2021 will be at least €56 billion while annual O&M costs will be at least €10.2 billion/year.

• The total capital investment costs for measures required by Articles 11(3)(b-l), 11(4) and 11(5) (WFD specific measures) will be at least €60 billion while annual O&M costs will be at least €3.9 billion/year.

• The total capital investment costs for all WFD measures will be at least €116 billion and annual O&M costs will be at least €14 billion/year.

• It should be noted that the costs have not been reported by all MSs and have not been annualised.

• Blue2 study tested a methodology for assessing costs of RBMPs in 8 different RBD’s and found that while all RBMPs provided some degree of information on costs there was significant variation in the level of detail provided.

Costs and benefits of the WFD - Costs

82 Wood

Total estimated costs of measures in the Tilde-Elbe RBD (Germany) ranged from 1,215

million to 1,375 million Euro, but the data was very heterogeneous (due to Germany

being a federal state). Blue2 study also used different baseline definition.

• The WFD requires that environmental and resource costs need to be recovered (Article 9):

– Lack of a definition of environmental and resource costs in the Art 9 and the lack of a standardised methodology regarding the quantification of such costs is consistently noted in the literature.

– The 2019 implementation report on RBMPs noted that steps were made in defining water services, calculating financial costs and assessing both environmental and resource costs when calculating cost recovery levels for water services. Environmental and resource costs are calculated for all reported water services in half of the Member States.

• However, significant gaps remain in translating the elements of economic analysis into concrete measures and achieving more harmonised approaches to estimate and integrate environmental and resource costs.

Costs and benefits of the WFD - Costs

83 Wood

• No quantitative/ monetary estimates of benefits of the WFD were

reported in the RBMPs. EC (2019) overview report on the 2nd RBMPs and

accompanying Member State reports have not provided any additional

benefit assessment data.

• Overall, very few comprehensive CBA studies on water management were

available and only the Netherlands, France and the UK have carried out

national studies on costs and benefits of WFD implementation.

• Furthermore, little evidence on monetised benefits of the WFD was reported

in the literature. The study on the costs and benefits of WFD implementation

(Acteon, 2012) estimated that the benefits of achieving good status in 70% of

EU water bodies would equate to 11 billion Euro per year.

Costs and benefits of the WFD - Benefits

84 Wood

The Impact Assessment on 2nd RBMPs in England, estimated total costs of

implementing PoMs at £17.5bn (PV, 2012-2052). The total benefits of implementing

programs of measures were estimated at £22.5bn (PV). BCR was 1.29 and the

monetised benefits covered benefits to general public, including recreation (bathing,

fishing, walking), aesthetic value and existence value (environment and wildlife).

• Overall, benefits of improved status of aquatic environment included avoided/reduced emissions to the environment and associated ecosystem services benefits, avoided adverse human health effects, reduced contribution to climate change, and direct financial/economic benefits.

• While it is clear that the effects from improvements from the WFD are significant in terms of environmental and socio-economic impacts –there are still relatively few attempts which comprehensively value benefits in monetary terms.

• Despite the ES approach highlighting a range of non-market benefits that are provided by waterbodies, there has been little to no integration of these approaches in the economic analysis for WFD.

• Fundamentally the benefits of attaining Good Ecological Status (GES)/GEP in a water body will vary according to the extent and the nature of the improvement and other site specific factors, limiting the ability to derive a national/EU total benefit estimate.

Costs and benefits of the WFD - Benefits

85 Wood

• Overall, the lack of monetary cost and benefits estimates in the RBMPs limits the ability to derive a numerical cost-benefit ratio.

• At the same time the exemptions foreseen in Article 4(4) and Article 4(5) of the WFD allow Member States in certain circumstances to consider whether anticipated costs of reaching environmental objectives would be disproportionate.

– For surface waters, technical feasibility, natural conditions and disproportionate costs are used as justifications.

– For groundwater bodies, mainly natural conditions and technical feasibility are used to justify these exemptions, with technical feasibility used more often than natural conditions.

• Article 4(5) exemptions have been applied more often in the second cycle than in the first in several Member States.

• It should be noted that the WFD does not provide a legal definition of “disproportionate costs” and Member States have varying interpretations of disproportionality (both in terms of the benchmarkand the threshold).

Proportionality of costs and benefits

86 Wood

• Consultation considered how do the costs in relation to the

implementation of WFDF, GWD and EQSD compare to the

benefits they achieve.


87 Wood

0 100 200 300 400 500 600

The costs are justified given the benefits that

have already been achieved in the short term


have already been achieved in the longer term


will be achieved in the short to medium term


will be achieved in the long term

Strongly agree Agree Neither agree nor disagree Disagree Strongly disagree

• RBMPs do not report on administrative burden and costs associated with developing the Plans and WISE reporting.

• There is some evidence that administrative barriers caused implementation delays in RBMPs for some countries which may be linked to disparate capacity on a national level.

• Stakeholders have also highlighted room for improvement regarding the synchronisation of reporting for water-related Directives, but no comprehensive data was presented in the literature.

• Open public consultation results suggest that apart from business associations, business organisation and trade unions, the majority of the respondents believe that there is no evidence the WFD has imposed a disproportionate administrative burden on authorities (national, regional or local), economic operators (e.g. industries, water companies), individual citizens or other parties.

Administrative burden

88 Wood

• Overall, there is significant variation in costs of PoMs and anticipated improvements in

water body status between Member States. However, the costs and benefits depend on a

wide range of factors, e.g. the number and size of water bodies failing good status, types and

number of pressures to be tackled and selection of measures.

• Respondents to the consultation provided their views on whether the cost-benefit ratio

associated with implementing the Directives differ between Member States. The majority

of the respondents did not know if the CBRs differed between Member States/ regions.

• The respondents who noted such differences highlighted the following factors:

– Classification of water bodies - significant variations in water body status requiring

different levels of mitigation efforts.

– Location of water bodies (urban and rural areas) and differences in (unit) costs.

– Number of waterbodies – e.g. compliance costs are higher in Scandinavian countries (~

30,000 water bodies (lakes) per country) in comparison to continental Europe (100-200

waterbodies per country).

– Demographic and socio-economic conditions (e.g. population density, key industries) -

leading to a varying scale and pattern of measures and associated costs/benefits.

– Climate conditions, hydrology/ geology

• Overall, costs and benefits vary depending on the initial water body status (ecological and

chemical) and socio-political consideration given to water protection objectives.

Differences in costs and benefits

89 Wood

• Respondents to the open public consultation considered factors that have had the most

impact on improving water quality and efficiency of water use:

• Use of more efficient waste water treatment technologies and better technologies in reducing

water consumption of household appliances have had the most impact on improving water

quality and efficiency (76% of responses, moderate to very significant improvement).

• Other factors included:

– integrated river basin management, increased accountability, increased cooperation

between water users and authorities.

– academic research and innovation in improving efficiency in water use and addressing

possible sources of contamination (74%).

– changing approaches to the use of water for energy generation (69%).

– more publicly available information on water quality, availability and allocation (68%)

– increased international cooperation (66%).

• Targeted stakeholder consultation noted further factors - political will to tackle pressures in a

strategic and holistic way, the ability to finance measures, full participation of

stakeholders and the general public in the definition of objectives and PoMs, appropriate

consideration of the costs and benefits in the preparation of PoMs and availability of

sufficient staff capacity and expertise in Member States.

Factors influencing efficiency

90 Wood

Opportunities for further simplification

91 Wood

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Further simplification of the law is possible

Further optimisation of the law is possible

Further optimisation of the implementation of the Directive/s is

possible

Stronger links could be made with technical, research and

innovation progress

Strongly agree Agree Neither agree nor disagree Disagree Strongly disagree

• The open public consultation sought to explore any aspects of the WFD (including EQSD and GWD) that are obsolete for achieving good status. The majority of respondents consider that the directives contain no obsolete requirements (51% for EQSD, 60% for the GWD and 61% for the WFD).

• The majority of respondents (43% of the 640 respondents) consider that the current reporting needs to be revised, improved or simplified highlighting its complexity and resource intensity (human & financial).

• At the same time a number of respondents note that the WFD must keep a high level of ambition and the existing methodological approach should be maintained to avoid compromising the Directive’s objectives.

• The positive role of the Common Implementation Strategy (CIS) (in establishing and streamlining reporting procedures) and WISE (Water Information System for Europe) (in providing a consistent and useful reporting format) has been noted.

Floods Directive

92

• Reported investment costs of the published FRMPs (2016-2021) are at least 12.5 billion Euro and these varied significantly between Member States. No details were provided in the FRMPs on annual O&M costs (with the exception of Finland).

• Costs associated with the development of preliminary flood risk assessments, flood hazard maps and FRMPs were not reported by the Member States (with few exceptions ranging between 5,000-50,000 Euro).

• Targeted stakeholder consultation provided further few cost estimates (ranging between 30 million Euro and 1.3 billion Euro).

• It is important to distinguish between the measures taken and planned by Member States specifically as a result of the Floods Directive requirements and the flood resilience and protection measures taking place under the baseline.

• In practice, a number of measures included in the FRMPs constitute baseline measures (e.g. the Rhine Flood Defence Action Plan with a total costs of €12.3 billion has been adopted in 1998, prior to the adoption of the FD).

Costs and benefits of the FD - Costs

93 Wood

• No estimates of total costs of the proposed Floods Directive to the EU28 were

provided in the Impact Assessment (IA) document.

• The IA highlighted that the costs of developing preliminary flood risk

assessment, flood risk maps and flood risk management plans (where

required) would vary based on the size of river basin districts.

• The administrative costs associated with FRMPs would depend on the

objectives and measures defined by the Member States and existing

approaches to flood risk management. Furthermore, the Fitness Check of

monitoring and reporting obligations arising from EU environmental

legislation estimated administrative burden of the FD as “moderate” (i.e. €

30,000 – 100,000).

Costs and benefits of the FD - Costs

94 Wood

On average cost of producing flood risk maps were estimated at between €100 and €350 per km2 of river

basin. Selected examples included:

• Germany: Costs of developing flood hazard maps for the whole of the Rhine were about €270,000

• France: Development of flood hazard maps for one catchment (Loire) cost around €3 million.

• UK: In England and Wales the costs of developing advanced and multi-purpose flood maps

(available online to all citizens by entering a post code) are estimated at €55 million. In Scotland,

the costs are estimated at €2.4 million.

The costs of developing flood risk management plans were not reported in the IA.

• Consultation identified the following key benefits of the FD:

– The Directive has positively contributed to coordination and development of a framework for managing flood risks.

– The Directive has positively contributed to raising public awareness about flooding and flood risk management.

– The exchange of information between different Member States through the likes of the Floods Expert Group were seen as important consequences of having action at the EU level, particularly for those Member States with more limited knowledge and resources to hand to implement the Directive.

– In some Member States the FD had instilled a different way of thinking about flooding, looking to identify and mitigate risk rather than reacting to flooding after it has occurred.

– The Directive is contributing to the Member State climate change adaptation efforts.

Costs and benefits of the FD - Benefits

95 Wood

• This is consistent with the benefit estimates in the IA that anticipated

reduced impacts on population, assets and environment from

floods events, improved cooperation between MSs and better public

awareness on flood risks.

Costs and benefits of the FD - Benefits

96 Wood

Under the no-adaptation scenario (i.e. assuming continuation of the current

protection against river floods up to a current 100-year event), EU damages

from the combined effect of climate and socioeconomic changes are

projected to rise from EUR 6.9 billion/year to EUR 20.4 billion/year by the

2020s, EUR 45.9 billion/year by the 2050s, and EUR 97.9 billion/year by the

2080s.

However, no details were provided on the baseline and the FD specific

benefits (EC, 2019)

• Targeted stakeholder consultation considered whether the implementation costs

of the FD are higher or lower than the benefits achieved.


97 Wood

• Overall, floods are responsible for billions of damages across Europe and investing

in flood risk mitigation is seen as beneficial. Average discounted returns on flood

management investment are commonly in the region of 10:1.

Monitoring requirements

98 Wood

• Views on the current monitoring requirements

• Information on costs from monitoring provided by few stakeholders. Ranging from € 3 million to €20 million per year (whole country)

• 43% of experts considered that the costs of monitoring requirements are lower than the benefits and 11% stated that costs and benefits are proportionate.

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Spatial

coverage

Frequency Period of

reporting

Parameters to

be monitored

I don’t know

Neither relevant nor

sufficient

Relevant, but not sufficient

Relevant and sufficient

Preliminary overall answer to main evaluation

question


What are the costs and benefits of the legislation and to what extent are the costs of the legislation justified

in light of the benefits achieved?

• Partial information is available on costs of RBMPs and PoMs from the Member State reports and other

sources (providing examples of costs at river basin or national level for some aspects of the

implementation). Virtually no monetary estimates of benefits of the legislation are reported in the RBMPs.

Benefits of improved water body status are hard to quantify despite its significance to many industrial

activities, ecosystem functioning and human wellbeing. However, a number of examples quantifying and

describing some of the benefits are available as illustrations.

• Quantification of costs and benefits is more straightforward for the Floods Directive. However

distinguishing between the baseline level of Member State investments and the Directive’s specific

measures remains challenging. In such a scenario, the additional costs are rather limited and the

additional benefits are hard to quantify.

• The comparison of the costs and benefits (where available) supports the views echoed by stakeholders

that the benefits are higher than the costs, contributing to the overall idea that the legislation, while

demanding and costly (in terms of measures to implement) is worthwhile.

• Considering the scale of potential damages from flood events, the comparison of costs and benefits of

the Flood Directive also highlight the superiority of benefits over costs.


question


To what extent do the costs and benefits vary between Member States or regions? If there are differences,

what is causing them?

This question is prescribed by the Better Regulation guidelines, its aim is to verify that some Member States

are not disproportionately affected by the implementation of the legislation.

The aim of the WFD is to reach good status of water bodies, the level of efforts requested for each river

basin to reach this objective will be inherently different.

As such the fact that costs and benefits vary between Member States and, in fact, regions, is not seen as a

symptom of an inefficient legislation but rather a reflection of the nature of water.


question


What factors have influenced the efficiency, and can good practices of efficient implementation of the

Directive be identified?

Are there opportunities to simplify the legislation or reduce unnecessary regulatory cost without

undermining the objectives of the Directives?

• The synergies created between the Directives have been identified as a factor supporting the efficient

implementation of the Directives, by drawing from similar concepts but also being implemented and

delivered by the same competent authorities in some Member States.

• Cooperation of the water and flood authorities has been identified as an efficient implementation of the

legislation. Further cooperation, including the practical integration of the WFD objectives into other

policies (e.g. agriculture, industry) would deliver further benefits and avoid counter-productive situations.

• The efficiency has been greatest where there has been more detailed economic option appraisal and

more intensive public consultation.

Live questions and polling - efficiency

Agenda Item 8

102

103


open issues related to Efficiency Agenda Item 9

woodplc.com

LUNCH BREAK

105

Presentation 3 by the project team on Coherence

Agenda Item 10

Overview of coherence

106 Wood

• Internal coherence verifies that within themselves the

Directives are coherent, do not contradict themselves and

are sufficiently clear.

• WFD – lack of clarity with regards to some concepts and

definitions e.g. how to integrate climate change in

reference conditions and interactions between chemical

and ecological status, in particular having chemical

substances part of both aspects.

• Important to keep in mind that it is a Framework Directive,

details are being dealt with through the CIS process.

• Floods Directive - unclarity on definitions e.g. flooding.

• Unclarity about climate change provisions.

Internal coherence – WFD and DD

107 Wood

• Directives are integrated into the procedural framework of

the WFD with regard to RBMPs and public consultation.

• Overall streamlining and simplification have been

achieved.

• 95% of respondents consider the four Directives under the

scope of the Fitness Check to be ‘mostly or fully coherent

internally’.

• Despite these results some

examples provided of

incoherence

Coherence of the WFD and DD

108 Wood

Fully coherent

internally

38%

Mostly coherent

internally

57%

Not coherent

internally

5%

– The 2027 deadline for exemptions is not replicated for the

EQSD.

– The review cycle of the EQSD and the deadline set are not

aligned with the 6-year cycles of the RBMP in the WFD,

which is challenging to account for new substances if

introduced mid-cycle.

– The EQSD distinguishes ubiquitous pollutants from other

priority substances which is not the case under the WFD.

– River basin specific pollutants are considered as part of the

ecological status, while the Priority Substances and the

Priority Hazardous Substances are part of the chemical

status. Both are classified according to different scale, which

leads to some differences in the way these are applied.

Coherence of the WFD and EQSD

109 Wood

– The groundwater specific ecosystems should be taken

into account for groundwater quality assessment, just

as surface ecosystems are for WFD.

– There is a need for more coherence between the goals

set in Article 7 of the WFD and the EQSD as well as the

GWD.

Coherence of the WFD and GWD

110 Wood

• There are strong links between the Floods Directive and the WFD, both in procedures and in the programmes of measures.

• Further improvements in integration are possible at different levels. At the level of measure implementation, integration is realised due to stakeholder participation, but at national and EU levels, the Directives (and their related budgeting and reporting rules) are separated.

• Insufficient integration among biological, physico-chemical and hydro morphological elements.

• Flood protection may be reliant on hard engineered defenses which can alter the morphology of a river and therefore leads to the river achieving poor or bad ecological status. Therefore, considerations must be made to ensure the exemption of such measures where necessary. Similarly opportunity may be missed to reduce flood risk through the improvement of hydro morphological conditions of rivers.

Coherence of the WFD and FD

111 Wood

Coherence of the monitoring requirements

112 Wood

42

37

33

28

1 57

1 42

1 34

1 37

1 1 3

95

87

68

31

1 3

22

22

1 1 5

1 56

1 62

1 77

0% 1 0% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 1 00%

Water Framework Directive

Groundwater Directive

Environmental Quality Standards Directive

Floods Directive

Yes fully Yes, mostly aligned Some alignment but some issues Poor alignment Do not know

• Range of policies considered:

– Other water policy.

– Wider EU sectoral policies.

Coherence with wider EU policy?

113 Wood

Coherence with other water policy

114Wood

Overview coherence

115 Wood

8

1 0

7

4

32 32

3031

3 3

9

5

Drinking water Directive UWWTD MSFD BWD

Yes No I do not know

• Classification of status under the WFD and MSFD, as well as Nitrate Vulnerable Zones (NVZs) under the Nitrates Directive. The UWWTD also has this obligation regarding identifying Sensitive Areas (i.e. they are eutrophic or at the risk of eutrophication and designation can be for phosphorus or nitrogen or both).

• Setting specific quality objectives for water bodies (quality or quantity). This includes Good Status objectives of the WFD (including environmental quality standards (EQS) under the Environmental Quality Standards Directive (EQSD)) and Good Environmental Status (GEnS) under the MSFD. The UWWTD does not set such an objective, just the obligation for MS to review the identification of Sensitive Areas in intervals not beyond four years (Article 5(6)).

• Setting specific controls on pressures on water bodies. The Nitrates Directive does this through limiting application of manure to specified levels. The WFD includes some specific controls, such as requirements for a permit for abstraction. The introduction of specified controls is the major obligation of the UWWTD regarding treatment level and performance.

• Setting obligations for controls on pressures to be determined during implementation. This is the principle route of action of the WFD and MSFD – for MS to work out which controls are needed to meet the quality objectives. These may include actions on WWTP or nitrates if the controls under the UWWTD and Nitrates Directive are insufficient to meet the objectives.

Key interactions of water legislation

116 Wood

• With WFD: Coherence is mostly addressed through the

protection of sources of drinking water under Article 7

WFD.

• Evaluation of the DWD found it coherent with the WFD.

• With GWD: do not define specific groundwater

requirements in drinking water catchment areas.

• With EQSD: do not define specific requirements for

surface waters that directly or indirectly serve the drinking

water supply.

Drinking water Directive

117 Wood

• Two direct explicit interactions between the UWWTD and WFD.

– Sensitive Areas under the UWWTD are listed as one type of ‘protected area’ under the WFD.

– Programmes of measures (WFD Article 11) include basic measures derived from other EU law and these include the requirements of the UWWTD.

• General obligation under the UWWTD for appropriate treatment.

• The Water Framework Directive includes obligations of results, on the quality and status of waters, whilst the Urban Waster Water Directive sets obligations of treatments and technologies to be applied.

– This difference does not prevent both Directives to work alongside each other.

Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive

118 Wood

• Strong interactions between the WFD, the FD and the

UWWTD.

– For example heavy changes to the hydro morphology

of a basin can raise the vulnerability from floods events.

During such events, waste water treatment can

overflow which will lead to an increase of pollutants

reaching water bodies.

• Parallel evaluation of the UWWTD found that both

Directives were mostly coherent.

Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive

119 Wood

• Many similarities and potential synergies among the WFD

and the MSFD.

• Different approach to assessment

• WFD and MSFD spatially overlap on coastal waters. WFD

covers transitional and coastal water up to 1 nm from the

continental baseline, and the MSFD all marine waters in

the Exclusive Economic Zone.

• The MSFD states that in areas where the two Directives

overlap, the MSFD is only intended to cover pressures that

are not already covered by the WFD (e.g. noise, litter,

some components of biodiversity).

Marine Strategy Framework Directive

120 Wood

• Some of the pressures covered by the WFD have an impact on marine waters, including pollution from agriculture (nutrients and pesticides), industry and urban areas. The MSFD has also strong connection with the WFD objective of achieving hydro morphological conditions that support good ecological status.

• Application of EQSD in transitional and coastal waters is challenging due to differences for sampling / monitoring but also the standard themselves.

• Efforts are needed for the management of sediments and articulation between the WFD and the MSFD.

• More efforts are needed for the management of nutrients in particular with regional Seas.

Marine Strategy Framework Directive

121 Wood

Overview of coherence with other sectoral policies

122 Wood

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

EU Strategy on Green Infrastructure

Biodiversity policy

Chemicals policy

Marine protection policy

Climate change adaptation and mitigation policy

Industrial emissions policy

Air quality policies

Waste policies

Resource efficiency

Environmental liability

Environmental crime

Transport policy

Health protection

Agricultural policies

Research and innovation

Life+ Funding

Regional policy

Civil protection policy

Fully coherent Partially coherent Neither coherent nor incoherent Incoherent

Coherence between water and agricultural policy

123

• Agriculture is one of the main drivers affecting status of groundwater and surface waters.

• Legislative instruments are not incoherent, it is their application and implementation that highlight the challenges from potentially conflicting uses of water.

• Commonly reported that cooperation needs to be improved considerably between environment/water officials and their agricultural counterparts.

• Hydromorphological measures are conflicting with traditional agricultural practices (e.g. augmentation of supply through small-height reservoirs and levees, irrigation channels, land drainage, etc).

• CAP measures depends also on the RBMPs content.

Water and agriculture

124 Wood

• Unclear also how results of the WFD assessments (carried out at river basin scales) demonstrating the significance of pressures from agriculture are consolidated nation-wide for supporting changes in agriculture policy implementation. In the majority of cases, this is not taking place, in particular when RBMPs are “paper plans” with scopes limited to compliance with other pieces of water legislation.

• Nutrients is considered an issue to be dealt by the Nitrates Directive (ND) however measures required under the ND outside Nitrate Vulnerable Zones are voluntary.

• Pesticides and chemicals are a new concern, where monitoring should be improved.

Water and agriculture

125 Wood

• Ongoing revision of the CAP, expected to place a greater

emphasis on water and environment but also to ensure

that payments are only made to incentivise practices that

do not harm the environment.

• Conditionality added to EAFRD and ERDF has been noted

as a positive aspect.

Common Agricultural Policy

126 Wood

Coherence between water and transport policy

127

Coherence overview

128 Wood

6

8

4

5

20

1 8

Inland navigation Transport


• Navigation activities and infrastructure have got an impact on hydromorphology.

• Article 36 of the TEN-T Regulation requires ‘good navigation status’ and taking into account EU water law including the WFD.

• Waterways have to help in reaching the full potential of inland navigation in Europe. However, the TEN‐T Guidelines do not provide a definition for "good navigation status”.

• Article 16 establishes priorities for inland waterway infrastructure development and outlines that priority should inter alia be given to "paying particular attention to the free-flowing rivers which are close to their natural state and which can therefore be the subject of specific measures“.

• Some examples of good coherence of the transport and water legislation.

Inland navigation

129 Wood

• Specific situation for port and estuaries.

• Challenges of dealing with sediments from upstream that

might carry pollution.

• Challenges of dealing with lack of sediments if dams or

obstacles upstream.

• Opportunities for more cooperation between port

authorities and wider basin were identified.

Port and estuaries

130 Wood

Coherence with other environmental policies

131

• Overall no formal incoherence identified.

– Data gathered under REACH was found to be seldom

used for water purposes. To be more relevant, (more)

use could be made out of the authorisation process of

REACH to gain information on substances.

– Safety assessments could take into account emissions

to waste water, the efficiency of waste water treatment

and emissions to water bodies.

– Work between the EQSD and REACH could be further

enhanced.

REACH

132 Wood

• Some practical challenges to apply legislation, for example

with regards to the use of anti-foulant for hull of ships

which as a product is regulated and authorised under the

Biocides legislation but can be restricted due to water

protection requirements.

• Biocides are noted to prevent invasive alien species, of

which 70% are aquatic species.

• So challenge of balancing potential threats to water.

Biocides legislation and chemical pollution

133 Wood

• Overlap between permitting emissions (including water) under the IED and measures under the RBMPs.

• Challenge to combine the EQS approach with the Best Available Techniques approach, as the Emission Limit Values included can be particularly high when compared to the EQS.

• Gaps:

– Limited attention to water efficiency in the IED BREFs.

– Not enough attention of atmospheric deposition into waters which has been identified as a major source of pollution from the latest EEA analysis.

– No control of mercury emissions which has been identified as major source of chemical status failure.

Industrial Emissions Directive

134 Wood

• Many examples of synergies between the implementation of the Habitats Directive and the achievement of the WFD objectives.

• Potential contribution of floodplain restoration for ecosystems and for flood resilience highlighted in recent EEA report.

• European Commission Guidance has clarified the relationship between terminology used in the Nature Directives and in the WFD.

• Differences in the way infrastructures are authorised under the Habitats Directive (Article 4) and WFD (Article 7) can lead to some confusion.

• Differences between limits of habitat areas and river basins means that some measures can be difficult to align.

• Although there are differences in objectives and assessment, there are no objective obstacles which would prevent these Directives from working together efficiently and exploit synergies.

Habitats Directive

135 Wood

Overview coherence with climate change policies

136 Wood

8

10

5

9

2

20

22 22 2223

12

1011

9

13

RED Adaptation policy Water scarcity Climate proofing Greeninfrastructures


• Some challenges in MS between the objectives of the RED

and the WFD in particular for hydropower.

• Tools have been used by Member States to mitigate this

including the review of hydropower permits, the

prioritisation of rivers restoration and assessment

techniques.

• Seen by some as restriction in development of

hydropower due to the application of the WFD.

Renewable Energy Directive

137 Wood

• Climate proofing observed as part of the 2nd RBMPs and

1st FRMPs.

• Climate change is considered mostly with regard to water

quantity, but quality is also an important aspect to

consider.

• Climate change consideration as part of the Flood

planning is critical

Climate change

138 Wood

• The failure of water bodies with relation to mercury raise

the question of whether the Minamata Convention

principles are sufficient to address mercury pollution.

• IMO conventions apply also in seaports; they allow for

certain air and water emissions that may be forbidden by

WFD, this is the example of open loop scrubbers

• Many comments with regards to Sustainable Development

Goals that require full implementation of the WFD in order

to be achieved, in particular SDG6 on clean water and

sanitation.

• The FD is coherent with the requirements of the Sendai

priorities.

Coherence with international requirements

139 Wood


question


To what extent is the legislation coherent internally?

• No internal coherence issue has been identified with regard to the Directives. Some lack of clarity

around terminology and definitions were identified in all Directives, but these have been or are

being addressed as part of the implementation of the Directives.

• Some incoherence were identified between the WFD and the EQSD related to the difference

between pollutants covered by the EQSD and river basin specific pollutants. These do not seem

to undermine the achievements of the objectives of the Directives but more coherence could be

reached.

• Some further integration between the implementation of the WFD and the FD was identified,

this could lead to further efficiency. However it is important to note that the coherence of the

WFD and the DD has been emphasised. This is expected considering these Directives were

drafted to be complementary to each others.


question


To what extent is the legislation coherent with wider EU policy?

• There is overall good coherence between the legislative framework considered.

• Other water policy: the interaction with the Nitrates Directive, Urban Waste Water Directive,

the Drinking Water Directive and Bathing Water Directive, all basic measures under the WFD

were noted.

• Challenges in the prioritisation of competing uses for water were noted, these are expressed

through the lack of a tool to assist in prioritising water use.

• No fundamental incoherence in the legislation themselves were identified but instances of

implementation leading to incoherence was identified.

• Challenges for land use were reflected in the consideration of the coherence of the FD with

the wider legislative framework, in particular with land use planning policies and civil

protection policies. However, no specific issue was identified


question


To what extent is the legislation coherent with international obligations?

The WFD and the FD are coherent and support the international commitments

including the UNECE convention on desertification, the Sustainable Development

Goals, the Sendai Framework etc.

Some examples of incoherent implementation of some international requirements

were identified (e.g. MARPOL and IMO) however there is no contradiction that can

be identified in the legislation themselves.

Live questions and polling - Coherence

Agenda Item 11

143

144


open issues related to Coherence Agenda Item 12

145

Presentation 4 by the project team on Relevance

Agenda Item 13

• Main evaluation question to be answered

– To what extent are the objectives of the WFD and the FD still relevant and properly addressing the

key problems and concerns related to water that ecosystems and EU society presently face?

• Sub-evaluation questions

– What are the needs of EU society in relation to the quantity of available water and to what extent

to the objectives of the Directives address these needs?

– What are the key pressures threatening good status of water bodies in the EU and the frequency

and severity of floods that ecosystems and EU society currently face?

– Have these pressures become stronger or weaker?

– What defines sustainable management of water resources in the EU, what is the need for it and

how do the FD and WFD contribute to it?

– How well adapted are the Directives to technical and scientific progress and new possibilities

arising from technological innovation?

• Approach

– Triangulation based on literature review and consultation activities (OPC, Targeted Survey,

Stakeholder workshops, Focus Groups, Interviews)

Introduction


Relevance - Evaluation Questions


Objectives

WFD

Continuous threats to good water status result

in insufficient water status of (selected)

freshwater bodies in Europe

Problems

Protect &

enhance status

of aquatic

ecosystems

1) Protect and enhance aquatic ecosystems

2) Promote sustainable water use

3) Protect and improve aquatic environment

4) Reduction pollution of groundwater

5) Mitigate effects of floods & droughts

Sufficient quantities of good quality

freshwater in Europe for citizens, industry

and ecosystems

Needs

FDManage flood risks (reduce

adverse consequences)

GWD

Prevent and

control

groundwater

pollution

EQSD

Good surface

water chemical

status (prevent

pollution)

Is there (still) a problem?

Is there (still) a need?

Do the objectives of the FD

and the WFD (still)

adequately address this

need and problem?

How well adapted are the

WFD and the FD to

technological/scientific

progress?


148

• Citizens

– European citizens consider guaranteed

water and sanitation for all is a vital

component of civil rights, (Right2Water

campaign, 1.8m signatures).

– Eurobarometer – 36% of respondents

(n=28,000) consider the pollution of rivers,

lakes and groundwater as the most

important overall environmental issue (#4

after CC, air pollution, waste), and a similar

share of respondents mentioned shortages

to drinking water and droughts/floods.

– Water for drinking and for the protection of

natural waters and their associated

ecosystems top priorities in OPC.

– OPC result also show that 62% is concerned

for both quality and quantity and another

20% mainly about quantity of water in the

context of climate change.

What are the needs for freshwater?


When you think of water and its different uses and functions, which of the following do you

consider as a priority? [1,700 respondents]

0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%

Drinking water sources and the

supply systems

Protection of water from pollution

Availability of water for irrigation in

agriculture

Availability of water for irrigation in

agriculture

Availability of water for industry

Availability of water for recreation

Availability of water for transport

purposes

Availability of water for energy

production

Protection of natural waters and

their associated ecosystems

Prevention and protection from

flooding

I do not know No Priority Low priority

Medium priority High priority

• Industry

– Many sectors throughout Europe rely heavily on access to clean and sufficient water

• Sectors with full or large dependence on water produce 5% of EU GDP.

• Those sectors play critical role in economy (electricity, agriculture, water supply).

• Including sectors with partial dependence the number increases to 25% of EU GDP.



Electricity

production,

45%

Agriculture,

28%

Water supply

and sewerage,

16%

Coke,

chemicals

and

pharmaceuti

cals, 4%

Ecorys et al (2018), BLUE 2 – The economic value of water

Water abstraction as a share of total water abstraction in the EU (2017)

• Ecosystems

– Healthy aquatic ecosystem provide a source of food and water, flood protection

and coastal protection, purify water and provide a platform for recreational

activities.

– The delivery of such ecosystem services derived from aquatic environments are

generally enhanced when the ecosystem itself is in greater condition, therefore

increasing the benefits that humans obtain.



• Despite improvements, many surface waters in Europe not yet in good

condition.

Is there a problem?


Surface water quality

• Despite the ecological status of surface water

bodies increasing in many regions, significant

proportions of water bodies remain in poor

condition due to hydro morphological

pressures.

• Chemical pollutants continue to significantly

impact the chemical status of European surface,

despite reducing loads – diffuse pollution and

atmospheric deposition most significant

pressures.

• Rate of biodiversity loss strongest in aquatic

ecosystems; freshwater and inland surface

water species particularly threatened in Europe

(73% of aquatic habitat types show unfavorable

conservation status) (IPBES, 2018).

Surface water quantity

• Population exposed to water stress

conditions remained relatively unchanged

since 1990 (~33% of the population).

• Around 20% of the total EU-28 river basin

area still exposed to water stress conditions

annually. The total area exposed has declined

slightly since 1990.

• Despite improvements, not all groundwaters in Europe not yet in good

condition either (and better than ground waters).

Is there a problem?


Ground water quality

• Groundwaters in relatively better condition

compared to surface waters, but also not all in

good status (yet) – see effectiveness.

• Limited improvement in chemical status

between 1st and 2nd cycle.

• Nitrates were noted as a pollutant amongst 24

MS 2nd RBMPs, causing a failure of reaching

good chemical status in 18% of groundwater

body areas by area, as opposed to pesticides

causing failure in 6.5% of groundwater bodies

by area.

Ground water quantity

• 9% of EU groundwaters quantitative status

remain in poor condition, compared to 90% in

good condition – so comparatively ground

water quantity smallest problem.

• Groundwater quantitative status concentrated

mostly in Southern regions (Malta, Cyprus,

Southern Spain and East England).

• Over abstraction for public water supply and

agriculture by far the largest pressure.

• Water quality

– Persistentance of ubiqutous substances such as mercury.

– Nitrogen deposition is expected to remain elevated up to 2050, whereas sulphur

and oxidized nitrogen are projected to continue to decrease.

– Underlying problem drivers such as urbanization, population growth and economic

growth will continue to put pressure on release of pollutants in waters.

– Increasing demand for renewable energy and low-carbon transport options will

continue to exert pressure on hydro morphology of rivers.

• Water quantity

– Studies project large increases in the frequency, duration and severity of

meteorological and hydrological droughts in most of Europe over the 21st century,

with the greatest increase in drought conditions projected for southern regions.

– Groundwater recharge rates expected to decrease throughout most of

Mediterranean, with slight declines in Ireland and large parts of France. Areas

surrounding the Alps are expected to increase.

– Continued rise in demand expected from agriculture, energy, consumers at home

(due to population increases), and tourism.

How is the situation likely to evolve?


Do the objectives of the WFD adequately address

the needs?


• Needs defined by good quality and sufficient quantity of water.

Good quality

• Based on both legal review and opinions from

stakeholders, overall objective is both broadly

phrased as well as comprehensive. Because

not specifically defined, the objective is still

considered relevant and adequately linked to

the problem.

• Combination of non-specific, yet

comprehensive objective in relation to water

quality with very specific biological and hydro

morphological quality indicators (Annex V),

however creates challenges for implementation

of the WFD.

• One challenge mentioned in particular is the

threat of invasive fish species that impact

biological quality indicators, but cannot easily

be dealt with as interconnectivity of waters is

also promoted by the WFD.

Sufficient quantity

• Purpose of the WFD is comprehensive on the

ambition to cover good quantity of water:

– Promoting sustainable water use based on

long term protection of available water resources.

– Contributing to provision of sufficient supply of

good quality surface water and ground water as

needed for sustainable, balanced and equitable

water use.

• Yet ‘sustainable water use’ not defined by the

Directive, neither is quantity a status

indicator for surface waters.

• Given political reality (interpretation of

subsidiarity principle), WFD integrates

sustainable management of water as good as

it can (chemical and ecological indicators rely

on quantity indirectly, water pricing policies).

• Implementation is ineffective though (also the

strategy against Scarcity & Droughts).

Floods Directive

156

• European’s citizens, industry and cultural heritage can suffer severe damage

from floods as natural disasters:

– Floods can cause casualties among its citizens, damage economic assets from its

industry and destroy precious cultural heritage in the EU (recitals FD). For the period

1980-2017, flood events in the EU have caused ~2,500 fatalities and >EUR 150

billion of economic losses to European industry (EEA).

– Since 1870, the most common form of flood events has been flash flooding

(accounted for 56% of all flood events), fluvial flooding (39% of all flood events),

coastal flooding (4%) and compound events (1.5%) (Paprotny et al., 2018).

– Within flood-prone areas, the percentage of population, GDP and wealth which are

exposed to 100-year flood events has decreased slightly for river floods, yet

increased for coastal floods. However, regional variations exist.

– The majority of respondents to the OPC agreed that flood risk is a problem that

needs to be tackled in their country/region.

What are the needs of EU society?


Do you think that flood risk is a problem that needs to be tackled in your country or region?

476 1 279

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Grand total

No Yes

• Frequency and severity of flood events

– Yes, the number and duration of flood events have increased over time, as well as

the instances of severe flood events.

– 2010 was a peak ‘disastrous’ year after implementation of the FD, since then much

less flood events.

– Long term projections however predict increasing severity and number of flood

events.

Is there (still) a problem? – Floods Directive


Source: EEA-ETC-ICM Flood Phenomena dataset, 2015

0

2

4

6

8

10

12

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

1980

1981

1982

1983

1984

1985

1986

1987

1988

1989

1990

1991

1992

1993

1994

1995

1996

1997

1998

1999

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

2005

2006

2007

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013

2014

2015

Num

ber

of

flood e

vents

/

avera

ge d

ays p

er

flood event

Cum

ula

tive d

ays o

f fl

ood event

Moderate Severity High Severity

Very High Severity Total Sum of FP_Duration

Days/flood event Linear (Total Sum of FP_Duration)

• The frequency and magnitude of extreme weather events are projected to increase

throughout Europe:

– Sea-level rise and an increase in the frequency and severity of extreme rainfall are expected to

increase coastal, fluvial and pluvial flood risk throughout Europe.

– The projected increase of flood peaks is expected to rise significantly even in regions where the

overall frequency of flooding is projected to decrease.

– The magnitude of flood hazard is expected to increase with higher levels of warming.

• Climate change is projected to inflict greater impacts on human activities:

– The expected annual population affected and expected annual damage by floods is projected

to increase in most European regions.

How is the problem likely to evolve? – Floods

Directive


Flood risk Flood hazardImpact on human

activities+=

Frequency MagnitudeExposure

(people & assets

in hazard zones)

Vulnerability

(susceptibility to

damage)

• Do the objectives of the FD (still) adequately address the need for protection

from the adverse consequences of flooding?

– The FD provides a comprehensive and flexible framework for addressing the

consequences of flooding – the broad and non-specific objective is relevant and

will continue to be relevant in the future as flood risk is not likely to decrease.

– The fact that the FRMPs can be dynamically generated based on needs and threats

in specific regions, all types of floods and regional characteristics can be taken into

account (consultation results).

– Stakeholder surveys (targeted and OPC) confirm that the management

framework as set by FD is relevant, though the majority claims ‘to some extent’

and mentions a number of shortcomings related to the Directive (as discussed in

effectiveness).

– However, the largest challenge lies in addressing pluvial flooding.

Do the objectives of the FD adequately address the

needs?


To what extent does the flood risk management framework established by the FD

meet the current needs (i.e. reduce the adverse consequences from flooding) ?

2 40 19

0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%

Grand Total

To a small extent To some extent To a large extent

Are the WFD & FD future proof?

161

• The majority of stakeholders responding to the expert part of the OPC

mention that all Directives in scope are still relevant and up to date:

– In particular the FD and the GD do not contain parts that are obsolete according to

stakeholders. Due to its more specific and prescriptive nature, the WFD and EQSD contain more

elements that are considered obsolete by stakeholders, but the majority of stakeholders

mention the communication problems behind ‘one-out-all-out’ principle to be out of date.

– Generally Directives take into account climate change, but to a mixed extent:

• WFD: stakeholders claim on the one hand flexibility, while on the other that none of the

targets and reference conditions take into account climate change explicitly.

• FD: Some confusion about when to explicitly take climate change into account (according

to most in 2nd FRMP cycle).

Do any of the Directives’ objectives need to be

updated?


To what extent do the Directives contribute to managing the challenges arising from climate change in

the EU, and to addressing its consequences?

Are any aspects of the WFD, EQSD, GD and/or FD now obsolete for achieving good status or flood

risk reduction?

57

139

155

152

73

86

136

34

272

205

181

193

137

107

55

159

0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%

Water Framework Directive

Groundwater Directive

Environmental Quality Standards Directive

Floods Directive

I do not know Negative effect To no extent

92

191

198

233

368

335

290

289

144

36

79

37

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

WFD

GD

EQSD

FD

I do not know No Yes

• OPC results show there is strong support for continued EU action in fields of

the WFD and FD that concern contemporary and future challenges:

– 42% of respondents think risks from emerging pollutants, standardized

approaches to monitoring and standards for risks from mixtures of pollutants

should only or best be dealt with at EU level (number 1, 2 and 3 issues for EU action

in the overall list).

• One competent authority however also mentioned that the continued

intervention and effectiveness is uncertain after the final deadline of 2027 and

it is unclear what happens after 2027, while the needs and relevance of the

Directive will likely continue to exist after 2027.

A continued need for EU action?


• Major technological and scientific progress since the adoption of the Directives, partially

stimulated by the implementation of the Directives. Particularly the following:

1. Monitoring and assessment:

– WFD: High quality satellite data, remote sensors, drone technology, DNA analysis,

bio-assays (measuring multiple stressors)

– FD: Innovations in hydrological and hydraulic science improve flood mapping.

2. Technological advancements in water treatment facilities and other point sources:

– Examples include reverse osmosis to clean wastewater and better landfill treatment

methods to filter effluent discharges.

3. Environmental management practices:

– Smart irrigation systems on the basis of wireless sensor networks to optimize water

use in agriculture.

– There is a growing body of science around the relationships and interaction between

multiple stressors (which some 40% of EU waters suffer from). The MARS program,

such a diagnostic ‘hierarchy-stressor’ tool was developed to help identify appropriate

options to address multiple stressors.

– Growing understanding and acceptance of nature-based solutions (GI) for both

floods and water quality.

How well adapted are the WFD/FD to

technological/science progress?


• Consultation results find that there are not many significant barriers in the (legal) design of

the Directives that could act as a barrier to uptake of technological/scientific progress.

• Most interviewees mention WFD has also incentivized innovation in a number of areas.

• Still, some stakeholders also outline practical difficulties to incorporate some technological

advances now and in the future:

– WFD Article 20: Annexes I and III and section 1.3.6 of Annex V may be adapted to scientific and

technical progress. Innovation may be of impact to more sections of the Directive (particularly

remainder of Annex V), but CIS Guidance Document 19 notes that implementation is open to

continues improvements in fields that are undergoing continuous changes through scientific research.

– There are some concerns however that the notion of the precautionary principle and the concern

about dropping indicators from the monitoring framework (for data continuity) that may become

redundant by new monitoring techniques will severely hamper efficiency improvements in the area.

– Also mixed results on whether the focus on biological structure indicators is effective for

meeting the (functional) objectives (it relies on the correct assumptions between structure and

function), but overall there was too limited evidence that the current approach is ineffective.

• OPC results also show stronger links could be made between technical, research and

innovation progress and WFD

– Operators are cautious to about

compliance with the Directives.

– Re-interpretation of Article 4(7) from

Weser ruling.

How well adapted is the WFD to

technological/science progress?


To what extent do you agree stronger links could be made with technical, research and innovation

progress?

Do not

know

Strongly

disagree

Disagree Neither

agree nor

disagree

Agree Strongly

agree

Total

Water Framework Directive 43 22 76 82 234 123 580

Environmental Quality Standards Directive 138 14 34 104 156 84 530

Groundwater Directive 135 14 34 66 160 112 521

• Also the design of the FD allows for flexibility when working towards FRMPs. The recitals of

the Directive state that Member States shall use appropriate ‘best practice’ and ‘best available

technologies’, but they are no specific requirements to do so in the articles.

• The FD also empowers the EC to adopt design of the FRMPs to scientific and technological

progress (Article 11).

• Therefore no legal impediments to uptake of scientific/technological progress found

(confirmed by consultation), but according to stakeholders some practical barriers remain:

– Some of the requirements and mandatory reporting fields for the PFRA should take into

consideration developments in flood modelling, which produces a lot of interesting and useful

information that cannot all be integrated in the PFRA template. A web-based map viewer could for

example facilitate it.

How well adapted is the FD to technological/science

progress?


Overall answer to main evaluation question (draft)


To what extent are the objectives of the WFD and the FD still relevant and properly addressing

the key problems and concerns related to water that ecosystems and EU society presently face?

• Both the FD and the WFD are found to be highly relevant policies, the need for whose have not decreased since

the Directives were implemented and due to their broad, non-specific and comprehensive objectives are still

targeting the needs and problems in the EU adequately:

▪ EU citizen’s level of support for intervention in the area of water and flood protection is high and the

economic dependencies of EU industry on sufficient and good quality water large.

▪ WFD: There has been progress in improving the status of waters in the EU, but a large share of EU waters are

still not yet in good condition (see effectiveness). Key pressures relate to hydro morphology, diffuse and

atmospheric pollution sources coming amongst others from agriculture, energy and transport will continue

to exist in the future.

▪ WFD: Relevance challenged by emerging substances. Though technically a process is in place for dealing with

those, the effectiveness is challenged due to the slow adoption of new substances.

▪ FD: Frequency and severity of flooding volatile in latest years (2010 peak year, flood events decreasing after),

but people exposed in flood areas increasing as well as flood risk predicted to increase in the future.

▪ WFD objectives comprehensively defined to tackle both the water quality and quantity needs of EU society.

They are non-specific and aim for ambitious status improvements. Water quality aspects better covered in

the WFD than water quantity issues, which suffer from implementation of cost recovery principles.

▪ FD objectives also comprehensive and adequately focused on reducing negative impacts of flood risk in line

with needs. Still appropriate as non-specific as well as flexible to needs and specificities in different regions.

Live questions and polling - Relevance

Agenda Item 14

168

169


open issues related to Relevance Agenda Item 15

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Tea / Coffee break

171

Presentation 5 by the project team on EU Added Value

Agenda Item 16

• Main evaluation question to be answered:

– What is the additional value resulting from the WFD and FD compared to what could

reasonably have been expected from Member States acting at national and/or regional level?

• Sub-evaluation questions:

– To what extent do the issues covered by the Directives still require action at EU level?

• Approach:

– Better Regulation Toolbox: “The analysis of EU added value is often limited to the qualitative,

given the stated difficulties to identify a counterfactual”.

– The counterfactual being the situation in which there was no WFD and FD and Member States

continued to address the challenges in their own ways, with minimal coordination.

– Method:

1. Identify the dimensions/measures of the Directives that can by design provide EU value

added (i.e. those that require coordination at EU level, are new compared to before etc.)

and test whether they were effective.

2. Corroborate this ‘bottom-up’ analysis with opinions from stakeholders from OPC and

targeted survey on the general EU value added of the Directives.

3. Determine whether the nature of the problem(s) remaining would benefit from continued

EU action.

Introduction


The additional value from the Directives - WFD


By design, the EU value added of the WFD could be significant and stem from various

dimensions:

Transboundary

cooperation &

Catchment-based approach

Most waters in

the EU are

transboundary; catchment-

based

approach

effective

Best practice

sharing and

uptake (CIS)

Innovative policy

measures

Supplementar

y measures in

the POMs

Pricing

mechanism/c

ost recovery principle

Public

participation

requirements

Combined

approach

Policy coherence

Mainstreaming

water policy in

other EU policy areas

Enforcement and legal

action

Long-term

water policy

planning

Legal action

and

punishments

• Transboundary cooperation & catchment-based approach– Most waters in the EU are transboundary and do not respect borders.

• International cooperation did exist before the WFD, but the fact that the WFD standardized

the catchment based approach at a transboundary level across the EU has stimulated the

development of more new international river basin and administrations.

• However, still a fair share of Member States with IRBs do not have IRBMPs developed

yet (EC, 2019).

• Slow progress towards more formal cooperation in IRBs is registered in the 2nd RBMPs.

• Work in the IRBD authorities has also become more effective:

– (i) facilitation where needed by the European Commission.

– (ii) the option for legally binding action via the European Court.

– (iii) the increased need to cooperate and implement measures due to the existence of the WFD.

Majority of targeted survey results mention this aspect as significant. However, in none of the

consultation channels, stakeholders could provide specific examples of where the value added would

be created.

– Sharing and uptake of best practices

• The IRBDs and especially the CIS process brings together competent authorities from

across the EU and discuss best practices and ideas regarding the way to implement the

Directive best and tips & tricks. Majority of stakeholders mentioned this as significant value

added, though could not provide concrete examples.



• Innovative policy measures

– Supplementary measures in the POMs are an indication of impact created towards good

status of water bodies beyond baseline measures from before the WFD and for compliance

with other Directives:

• A total of 12,800 basic measures and 10,157 supplementary measures were reported by

Member States in their 2nd RBMPs (EC, 2019). The 2019 implementation report however

does not contain information about the extent to which supplementary measures had

started or were completed. In 2015, the EC reported that by 2012 (during 1st cycle RBMPs): – In 1/3 of MS over 20% of supplementary measures had not been started in 2012.

– In 80% of MS, less than 20% of supplementary measures had been completed in 2012.

– Unless much more progress has been made (unclear), the realized EU value added

from supplementary measures is only moderate.

– Article 9 of the WFD requires Member States to put in place water-pricing policies that provide

adequate incentives for users to use water efficiently and that adequate contributions from

different users to the recovery of costs of water services is made (based on polluter-pays).

Only very few Member States applied such pricing policies before the WFD (potential EU value

added). However, the implementation of the Article is poor (EC, 2019):

• A significant share of MS apply for exemption to use the cost recovery principle, use a

narrow definition of what costs need to be covered and do not refer to incentive pricing

or adequate contributions clearly in their RBMPs.



• Innovative policy measures

– Article 14 on public information and consultation introduced as innovative element in the

WFD and thus set as standard for all MS to conduct. It could lead to greater involvement of the

public in developing water policy, leading to greater acceptance and understanding and

potentially better progress towards the objectives of the Directive. Implementation of the

Article can however be improved:

• Results from the targeted survey however indicate that the article is not always effectively

implemented (27 of 62 respondents) and some 20% of target survey respondents think the

Article was not effective in contributing towards the objectives of the WFD.

• 65% said “yes” but the majority were NGOs which may have a direct interest to say this.

• Respondents indicate there were little evaluations done on the effectiveness of public

participation, but those that were done found mixed results.

– The introduction of the combined approach for point and diffuse sources was another

innovative element introduced by the WFD that may not have been developed by Member

States in isolation (it was not common practice at the time the WFD came into force):

• The EU value added effect from the combined approach can be approximated by the use

and effect of the supplementary measures by EU Member States since the gap in

implementation towards the quality objectives (good status) left open by measures

covering source pollution control (the basic measures) are the supplementary measures.

• The EU Value Added from those therefore moderate due to impartial implementation.



• Policy coherence

– Some significant sources of pressure on freshwater bodies originate from policy areas that have

strong EU policies in place, notably agriculture, energy, navigation and chemicals. Reaching

good status for freshwaters is facilitated by mainstreaming WFD objectives into EU policies in

these policy areas, which can be done more effectively at EU level with water policy.

• Diffuse pollution from agriculture is a significant pressure, stimulated by the CAP

(agriculture), which is also the area with least coherence with the WFD according to

the targeted survey (49% of responses say CAP is incoherent, 22% coherent and 29%

does not know).

• To a lesser extent renewable energy policy (RED, 20% think it is incoherent/50% it’s

coherent/30% does not know), navigation policy (20%/13%/67%) and transport policy

(25%/13%/62%).

• Specific examples that demonstrate that there has been impact of this mainstreaming at

EU level (e.g. reform of the CAP).



• Enforcement and legal action

– Interviews also found that EU policy in the field of water brought more than what could be

expected at national level by providing a long term objectives for freshwater improvements,

aiding national administrations that are subject to elections and 4-year administration cycles to

make long term (not always popular) investments:

• Possible consequences of no EU policy could be reversal of investment decisions by new

administrations, delays in investments towards new cabinets, etc.

– In combination with the possibility of EC mediation, infringement procedures and the

requirement of establishing penalties at national level, the WFD provides a framework for more

legally binding action:

• On average 80 infringement cases per year in the field of water policy since 2007 – pressure

from potential infringement procedures results in better progress towards implementation.

• Illustrative example: Norway vs EFSA and NGOs about hydropower licenses.



The additional value from the Directives - FD


By design, the EU value added of the FD could be significant and stem from various dimensions

(though due to scope of the Directive smaller in magnitude than the WFD):

Transboundary

cooperation &

Catchment-based

approach

Catchment-based

approach also for

international waters more effective especially

for fluvial flooding

Facilitation of

transboundary

cooperation for IRBD especially helpful for

fluvial flooding

Standardised definitions

and approach

Standardized definitions

and approaches to flood

risk management

Promoting best practice

uptake in all MS

Legal action & dispute

settlement

Platform for (legal)

action and dispute

settlement for transboundary issues

• Transboundary cooperation and catchment-based approach:

– Catchment-based approach, also for international waters, more effective than

uncoordinated, isolated planning, especially for fluvial flooding.

• Most Member States choose similar geographic units and competent authorities.

– Though significant number of IRBs without formal international agreement or

international coordinating body. For those without agreement or body in place,

very limited information on international coordination or transboundary

APSFRs is available:

• Only for two of the IRB without agreement or coordinating body, joint measures were

identified.

• Moreover, the assessment of the FRMPs do not contain information on the mobilization of

financing for joint projects or initiatives in IRBs, except for one measure in the Duero RB

one measure, but even for that measure no costs are specified. There is therefore no

evidence on whether the transboundary cooperation facilitated by the Directive has had

any material impact on reducing flood risks.

– The potential for EU value added from transboundary cooperation is large, but given the lack

of evidence on concrete impact made only considered to be moderate.



• Standardised definitions and approaches

– Standardised approach universally well regarded by everyone and based on best practice (as

viewed by CAs and key private sector stakeholders), mentioned by key stakeholders in the

Floods Working Group as well as targeted questionnaire responses as largest benefit of the

Directive. EU value added created through more and better flood risk management

planning in majority of EU Member States (magnitude differs depending on the baseline

situation in each Member State).

• All Member States have implemented the five steps of the FD (EC, 2019), the templates of

which are based on best practice from across the EU.

• There were some Member States that did not previously use a risk management for flood

risk management, such as for example Cyprus that quoted that they did not have any

experience with FRM before (Focus Group).

– Standardised definitions have enabled competent authorities and Member States to

communicate and cooperate more effectively.

• For example, the insurance industry has been able to operate across borders more

effectively and/or better assess risks and impacts of potential flood events (and hence

insurance premia) with a transboundary element (interview results).

• There are however little concrete examples of the impact of the alignment of definitions

and feedback from the consultation activities revealed that more alignment of definitions

would be desirable, e.g. on defining low and high probability flood events.



• Legal action & dispute settlement

– Dispute settlement and issues with a transboundary nature can be raised to the Commission

and mitigated by the Commission between Member States (Article 8(5))

• Members of the CIS Floods Working Group specifically mentioned the possibility of

resorting to Commission action as a benefit of EU action. Article 8(5) establishes that issues

that cannot be resolved in one Member State may be reported to the Commission and that

the EC needs to react within 6 months with a report on the issue.

• In the countries of the representatives that mentioned this, it was not yet need to use this,

but the potential of using it provided value added to them.

– Infringement cases enforce uptake of the FD and ensure more pressure on implementation of

flood risk management than what could be expected without EU intervention.

• For example, in January 2019, the EC announced to take Spain to court for failing to

complete and publish flood risk management plans for all seven RBDs in the Canary

Islands.



• The effectiveness assessment has shown that, despite progress made, a large share of EU

waters is not (yet) in good status. The relevance assessment has also demonstrated that

there is therefore still a problem with waters in the EU that needs to be resolved.

– The rationale for continued EU intervention therefore remains unchanged

compared to the problem assessment at the start of the Directive: There is a reason

to act and there is value added to doing so at EU level.

• More specifically, the problems that remain currently and prevent further improvements

in the status of waters include, amongst others:

– Hydromorphological pressures

• Those pressures amongst others result from the hydropower sector and navigation, both

policy areas that are guided by EU level policy, justifying the need for continued

discussions at EU level to protect EU waters.

– (Chemical) pollution from agriculture

• The agricultural sector is also strongly guided by EU regulation and the CAP has been

identified as most incoherent policy with the WFD. Since the CAP will continue to exist for

the foreseeable future, continued EU action remains needed to safeguard the interests of

water policy objectives at EU level too.

Is there a need for further EU action? - WFD


• The relevance assessment shows that the two most important problem drivers for

heightened flood risk in Europe are likely increasing in the future, thus exacerbating the

risk of damages from future flood events and thus strengthening the need for

intervention. The benefits of EU intervention for flood risk management are experienced

to be positive, thus justifying the continued facilitation at EU level.

– Latest research on climate change impacts finds frequency and magnitude of flood events will

increase (increasing the flood hazard). The impact on human activities (exposure and

vulnerability) also expected to increase in the future.

• Fluvial: Due to climate change only, river flooding expected to increase by 220% towards

2100 in the EU.

• Pluvial: Frequency and intensity of extreme rainfall events are expected to increase further

(IPCC, 2013).

• Coastal: Due to predicted continued sea level rise and storms, the number of people

exposed to coastal flooding (even without population growth taken into account) is likely

to increase by 20% in the Netherlands and 18% in Germany for example (Muis, et al 2016).

– With FRMPs developed, but most measures to be implemented still, effectiveness of the

Directive expected to be delivered in the coming years.

The need for further EU action - FD


• Stakeholders strongly corroborate the finding for continued EU action in the area of

WFD and FD.

– All stakeholders at least to some extent agree that there is a need for continued action at EU

level in the area of the WFD and FD [total 61 respondents, one that said no was unintentional].

– Among the reasons mentioned are particularly:

• Continued need for coherence and coordination with other EU policy areas that are likely

to evolve (agriculture, transport, energy).

• EU funds will continue to be needed for more implementation of both Directives.

• Transboundary nature of waters will continue to exist and require collaboration.

Continued need for EU action – WFD & FD


1 29 31

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%

Do the issues covered by the Directives still require action atEU level?

No Yes, some Yes, fully

• Relevant stakeholders to the implementation of the WFD corroborate the significant EU

value added provided by the WFD and the FD overall:

– All stakeholders agree that the WFD and FD are at least positively significant, with a vast

majority (>70%) regarding the EU value added of the Directives as very significant [total 61

respondents].

– No significant differences between stakeholder groups with respect to the distribution of

answers.

– Purely for the transboundary rivers basins, stakeholders are slightly less positive but still very

positive overall to the EU value added of the Directives.

– Most clarifications indicate that the respondents have the WFD in mind when answering and

quote in particular the common planning, definitions and standards and the high ambition level

as elements that brought significantly more value to society than could have been expected

without EU action.

The additional value from the Directives


Overall answer to main evaluation question (draft)


What is the additional value resulting from the WFD and FD compared to what could reasonably

have been expected from Member States acting at national and/or regional level?

• By design, the WFD and the FD deliver significant EU value added particularly through facilitation of

transboundary cooperation of a policy area that is by nature not confined by borders (water). By endorsing a

catchment-based approach to freshwater and floods management across the EU, water management and flood risk

management approaches are standardized around the natural spatial definition of waters, increasing effectiveness

of measures taken to improve water status and flood risks.

• The degree of EU value added is comparatively larger for the WFD than for the FD due to the potential

significant impact of addressing water policy objectives in other EU policy areas that govern the most significant

pressures to freshwaters (notably agriculture, energy, navigation and chemicals).

• Due to ineffective and/or impartial implementation of the Directives in those areas where EU value added could

particularly be created, the realisation of EU value added is however below what could be expected.

• Most stakeholders consulted for the OPC, targeted questionnaire and other consultation activities express

significant support for the delivery of EU value added by both Directives. However, little concrete evidence could

be provided by stakeholders that illustrates the value added of EU coordination.

• The need for continued EU action in both freshwaters and floods is strong since (i) pressures on waters and

estimated flood risks are projected to increase in the future (ii) good status is not yet reached for many waters

(WFD).

Live questions and polling - EU Added Value

Agenda Item 17

188

189


open issues related to EU Added Value Agenda Item 18

190

Closing remarks and next steps

Agenda Item 19

• Draft final report – to be submitted the European

Commission mid-June

– Will take feedback from Workshop (receive today) into

account

– For any additional comment:

[email protected]

Timing for next steps

191 Wood

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