Abstract

The Water Framework Directive (WFD, 2000) ensures sustainable availability of good quality groundwater and surface water. Current drinking-water directives are partially addressed in the WFD, along with 'new' obligations such as the river basin approach. Existing regulations on substances and standards related to drinking-water production also conflict with each other. This report, ordered by the Dutch Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment (VROM) describes the influence of the implementation of the WFD on the protection of drinking-water resources. Streamlining standards and substances in the different relevant national pieces of legislation is advised in the report. In this way, discussions are clarified between water administrator and drinking-water company on the substances that cause problems in drinking-water production. Besides elaborating on the consequences of the WFD, the report also documents the implications for other regulations, for example, the one on spatial planning.
The WFD aims to achieve a level of protection at least equivalent to that provided in earlier legislation. There is already an obligation to deliver results with respect to the protection of drinking-water resources. New is the river-basin approach set out in the WFD. This means that in water management, the effect on downstream water quality needs to be taken into account, especially when specific quality standards (e.g. drinking-water resources) are involved. This holds for measures that directly influence water quality, such as the issue of permits for spills and the use of pesticides. However, this is also true for the admission of new substances to the market and the formulation of quality standards with neighbouring countries at border crossings situated in a river basin.
According to the WFD it is mandatory for European Member States to identify water bodies containing drinking-water abstraction points in a so-called 'Register of protected areas' and to carry out measures to achieve drinking-water objectives assessed at the abstraction point. One possible measure is to draw up a dossier, set up by all parties involved, and offer a framework for suitable protection and measures for that area. This measure is designed to accommodate the fact that each drinking-water resource (lake, canal and river) reacts specifically to pollution, and that the influence of such spatial factors as agricultural or industrial areas, varies per resource. Firmly establishing water quality in the spatial planning policy is advised, for example, to reduce point and diffuse pollution. The current Water Assessment is an inadequate instrument in this regard.