Aqua publica europea – ceep – EurEau
Workshop on the Drinking Water Directive
7 October 2015, Milan
Evaluation of the DWD – the European Commission
perspective
Dr. Claudia Castell-Exner, member EU commission 1
“Drinking water”
~ The European Union has a history of over 30 years of
drinking water policy:
~DWD was introduced in 1980 and revised in 1998.
~ The main pillars of the policy are to:
~Ensure that drinking water quality is controlled through
standards based on the latest scientific evidence;
~Secure an efficient and effective monitoring, assessment and
enforcement of drinking water quality;
~Provide the consumers with adequate, timely and appropriately
information;
~Contribute to the broader EU water and health policy;
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~ The Commission performed in 2014 a public
consultation on the quality of drinking water in the EU
in order to assess the need for improvements
Results call upon to improve its drinking water policy in certain areas
such as –
~ensuring dw quality in remote and rural areas;
~better information for the public;
~improve monitoring systems;
~materials and products in contact with drinking water;
~review list of parameters and values to be met
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To date, the Commission has made the following progress:
1) Revision of technical annexes:
~ Commission worked in close consultation with Member
States, experts and stakeholders on a revised text for
~ Annex II (Monitoring) and
~Annex III (Specification for the analysis of parameters)
~ On 20 April 2015, the Drinking Water Committee gave a
positive opinion to adapt these Annexes to scientific and
technical progress.
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~ The new Annex II provides an option to perform the
drinking water monitoring in around 100,000 water
supply zones in Europe in a more flexible way with
appropriate frequencies, provided a risk
assessment is performed ensuring full protection
of public health.
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~ It follows the principle of ‘hazard analysis and critical
control point’ (HACCP) used already in food legislation,
and the Water Safety Plan approach laid down in the
WHO Guidelines for Drinking Water Quality.
~ Annexes to be published in autumn 2015
~ Transposition period of 24 months.
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~ Concerning radioactive substances in drinking
water, in 2013 a Council Directive 2013/51/EURATOM
was adopted, to be transposed by 28 November
2015, superseding the radioactivity requirements in
Directive 98/83/EC.
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To date, the Commission has made the following progress (ff.):
2) Evaluation:
~ Evaluation of the overall Directive has been included in the
Commissions' Working Plan "A new Start" 2015, as
part of the wider response to the European Citizens
Initiative Right2Water.
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~ Objective of this ex-post evaluation under REFIT, the
European Commission's Regulatory Fitness and
Performance program, is to evaluate past and current
performance.
~ Overall aim of REFIT:
~to make EU law simpler, reduce costs … support growth and jobs.
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2) Evaluation (ff):
~ Evaluation and Fitness Check Roadmap - DWD:
“High quality, safe drinking water is essential for public health and well
being and an important asset for the economy. “
“Whilst not a commercial product like any other, water is
economically important”
“A good supply infrastructure is essential to provide high quality water
services to citizens and an essential precondition for the
development of economic activities.”
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2) Evaluation (ff):
~ External study has been launched.
www.safe2drink.eu.
~ The evaluation study report
providing further evidence is
scheduled for end 2015
~ Stakeholder consultation: 26
May 2015
~ Interviews with MS, NGO’s, service
providers etc. in June 2015
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~ It turns out to be very difficult to evaluate whether
the articles of the DWD are efficient, effective and
coherent
~ Next stakeholder consultation: 8 December 2015
-> presentation of the report
-> opportunity to address options
(what should be amended? What articles to keep …)
from stakeholders point of view
~ DG Env intends to launch a special study on materials
and products in contact with drinking water (12
months duration, starting in 11/2015)
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Back up slides
13/06/2014
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Interview Guidelines stakeholders: Academics
RELEVANCE
1. Are the overall objectives of the Directive (still) relevant for the
protection of human health?
2. Which parameters and related parametric values are relevant for the
protection of drinking water quality?
3. What is the relevance of the Directive‘s articles related to i) standard
setting ii) monitoring iii) proactive and remedial measures and iv)
communication?
EFFECTIVENESS
1. What is the scope of the Directive and to what extent does it cover the
needs of all EU citizens?
2. To what extent has the Directive achieved ist objectives?
3. What have been the (unintended) effects of the DWD beyond
protecting human health?
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EFFICIENCY
1. Is providing up-to-date information to consumers contributing to
the achievement of the DWD?
2. To what extent are the costs involved wiht implementing the DWD
justified given the changes which have been achieved?
3. What have been the factors influencing the efficiency of the DWD?
4. What has been the value of the risk based approach vs. monitoring
at the tap?
COHERENCE and EU value added
1. To what extent is the Directive coherent with other legislation in
the same policy area?
2. To what extent is the Directive internally coherent?
3. What has been the EU added value of the Directive?
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