Strategic Coordination Group State of transposition and implementation 22 February 2006 Agenda item 5 – State of transposition and implementation – first results -

Content WFD Scoreboard Approach for conformity and compliance checking First results for legal transposition, Art. 3 and Art. 5 compliance checking Conclusions and next steps

Report partially submitted “WFD Scoreboard” for 2004-2005 Country Notification (Art. 24) Completeness Conformity Intercalibration (Site selection) River Basin Districts (Art. 3 Reporting ) WISE submission RBD Analysis (Art. 5 Reporting) (non) communication (non) conformity (incorrect) implementation Symbols Explanations  Report subm. +WISE  Report submitted  Report partially submitted  Report not submitted WFD Scoreboard Status of information (28 May 2004): The WFD Scoreboard gives a quick overview on the performance of the Member States as regards the legal transposition and the implementation elements of the Water Framework Directive 2000/60/EC (WFD) which have deadlines during 2004 and 2005. Disclaimer: The information in the tables, although attempting to be accurate and up to date, may not necessarily reflect the latest formal information that is available to the Commission. Hence, this information does not necessarily reflect the views of the European Commission. It intended for general information to the public but is not the basis on which the European Commission decides upon the necessity to launch legal proceedings against the Member States for not fulfilling the obligations of the Directive. Thus, it can not be interpreted as an overview table on ongoing or planned infringement cases. Note: “WFD Scoreboard“ does not provide any information whether report is satisfactory and/or in line with the WFD

WFD Scoreboard 2004/2005 (EU 25 MS - part 1/3) AT BE CY CZ DE DK EE EL Notification (Art. 24)  *  ** Intercalibration (Site selection) River Basin Distr. (Art. 3 Reporting ) WISE submission  RBD Analysis (Art. 5 Reporting) Transposition of the WFD in the 15 former Member States Status of information (28 May 2004): Out of the 15 former Member States, 5 (AT, DK, EL, ES, IE) have notified the legal instruments to transpose the Water Framework Directive in time 2004. In addition, Germany and Belgium have partially transposed the Directive. Germany has adopted a national framework legislation but adoption of specific legislation in the 16 Federal States („Länder“) needs to be completed. Only few „Länder“ have finalised that process yet. In Belgium, only the Flemish Region has transposed the WFD, Wallonie and Brussels Region are still working on the transposition. From January to May, UK (with the exception for Gibraltar), France and Sweden have notified their legal transposition. *: transposition for Brussels Region missing **: first non-compliance case

WFD Scoreboard 2004/2005 (EU 25 MS - part 2/3) ES FI FR HU IE IT LU LT Notification (Art. 24)  *  Intercalibration (Site selection) River Basin Distr. (Art. 3 Reporting)  WISE submission RBD Analysis (Art. 5 Reporting) Transposition of the WFD in the 10 new Member States Status of information (28 May 2004): Out of the 10 new Member States, 8 have transposed and notified the Water Framework Directive by the accession date. MT and SK both confirmed that the transposition is completed, however formal notification to the Commission was still pending. This is expected to happen shortly. *: transposition for Aland Region not communicated

WFD Scoreboard 2004/2005 (EU 25 MS - part 3/3) LV MT NL PL PT SE SK SI UK Notification (Art. 24)   Intercalibration (Site selection) River Basin Distr. (Art. 3 Reporting ) WISE submission  RBD Analysis (Art. 5 Reporting) Infringements started by the Commission Status of information (28 May 2004): The Commission has sent a letter of formal notice as regards „non-communication“ to 10 Member States on 27 January 2004. Only FR and UK have responded and sent the legal instruments for transposition since then, however the UK laws did not cover Gibraltar. Reasoned Opinions are being prepared against 9 of the former 15 Member States for June 2004 for the following reasons: transposition missing completely: FI, IT, LU, NL, PT, SE transposition incomplete: BE (Wallonie, Bruxelles), DE (Länder), UK (Gibraltar) As regards the 10 new Member States, no legal procedures will be necessary as regards “non-communication”.

Other countries EEA countries have recently accepted WFD inclusion in EEA Agreement (formal inclusion shortly) Norway submitted Art 3 and is working on Art 5 reports Bulgaria and Romania submitted Article 3 and 5 reports

Rulings by the Court of Justice Non-transposition of the WFD: C‑33/05 – Belgium (15.12.2005) C‑67/05 – Germany (15.12.2005) C-85/05 – Italy (12.01.2006) C‑118/05 – Portugal (12.01.2006) Pending: Luxemburg Text of judgments available at: http://curia.eu.int/en/content/juris/index.htm

Legal Transposition

Conformity of legal transpositon External assessments started in March 2005 for EU10 and in Oct 2005 for EU15 DG ENV developed questionnaire developed to assist in the assessment Results for all MS expected in spring 2006

Compliance Checking - Article 3 reports -

Compliance checking Art. 3 (2004 report) Assessment based on questionnaire/template 3 main questions: - Is it complete? - Is it clear / understandable? - Is it compliant regarding key issues? Key issues: - River Basin District identification (hydrological boundaries, assignment of groundwater and coastal waters) - Competent Authorities (legal base, clarity of assignment of tasks, coordination mechanism within RBD and MS, relation to other relevant authorities) - International cooperation (legal base, arrangements for coordination) 23 MS draft Reports available – summary report under preparation

Draft map of RBDs Currently 23 MS: 134 RBDs Norway: 14 RBDs RO, BG, HR: 9 RBDs No double counting: 96 RBDs (for 23 MS) 69 national 27 international

Draft map of submitted main rivers and lakes As submitted by MS Criteria in reporting guidance not always followed GIS data not usable at the moment but would be useful to be updated

Draft map of large rivers and lakes Rivers > 50.000 km2 Tributaries > 5.000 km2 Lakes > 500 km2 Based on MS GIS submissions and improved with ESTAT database and CCM Selection of rivers based on ESTAT database

Distribution of number of RBDs 14 MS have 5 or less RBDs 5 MS have 10 or more RBDs UK: 17 RBDs (7 CAs) Distribution of number of CAs 10 MS have only 1 CA 5 MS have more than 10 CAs DK: 17 CAs (13 RBDs)

Distribution of surface areas of RBDs 29 14 Danube Rhine

Compliance checking - Preliminary results (1) Non-compliance issues: International cooperation with EU countries or non EU MS not always considered or discussed some CA set-up is complex with inappropriate coordination and unclear attribution of responsibilities Questions for clarification: Assignment of groundwater to RBD unclear RBD boundaries (ie. administrative basis rather than river basins) was not an issue, but sometimes still unclear Digital data set: Cross border intrusion/overlap No harmonisation across national borders Incomplete coverage Solution: update of datasets on WISE

Compliance checking - Preliminary results (2) Questions for clarification in all reports, however relevance and significance of open points varies Further in-depth assessment needed and discussion with MS needed for 9 reports – non-legal follow up envisaged at the moment Assessment reports available – will be sent to MS shortly Facts and figures summary will be published in a few months

Compliance Checking - Article 5 reports -

Compliance Questionnaire Art. 5 reports Compliance questionnaire based on Art. 5 reporting sheets Comparative screening assessment, will be complemented by selected in-depth assessment in a second step Three main questions: - Is it complete? (data supplied) - Is it clear / understandable? (completeness and clarity of information) - Is it compliant regarding key issues? (conformity checking) Two parts of conformity: 1. methodology 2. data or results

Article 5 reports - first information Draft compliance assessment for 13 MS available Assessment scale: - (national part of) River Basin District (134 reports) - in addition, assessment on national level or regional level, where necessary (e.g. BE, DE) For these 13 MS, some statistics are: Over 50.000 surface water bodies (SWB) 77% of SWB are rivers Over 4.000 groundwater bodies

Article 5 compliance checking - First impressions High diversity and different level of detail –> 60 pages vs. 24 CD ROMs Several very good examples (int. river basins) Many reports are incomplete and not comprehensive (e.g. chemical status, agricultural pressures) Methodologies very divers across Europe and rarely harmonised between national RBD and within int. RBD Difficult to extract comparable data for analysis or compliance checking – need for WISE submissions Considerable challenge to ensure that Art 5 analysis is complete and comparable when updated in RBMP

Follow up

Conclusions 90% of reporting obligations fulfilled Lack of transposition: Application to the Court Lack of reporting: Infringement procedure started Assessment of compliance started Art 3 compliance checking – draft assessments for 22 out 25 MS – summary report under preparation Art 5 compliance checking – draft assessments for half of the 25 MS – summary report for mid-2006 - several technical reports finalised (e.g. agriculture, hydromorphology, eutrophication) – only statistics not for compliance checking

Next steps Completion of assessment reports (Art 3 - Jan 2006 and Art 5 for mid-2006) Identify feedback mechanism to MS, in particular to clarify questions Demand for information on comparability of WFD implementation is increasing (eg. EP, MS, public) WISE should be used to improve and update incomplete/unclear reports Official Commission report in March 2007

More info All articles 3+ 5 reports are available at http: //forum.europa.eu.int/Public/ irc/env/wfd/library The draft maps are available at: http: //europa.eu.int/comm/environment/water/ water-framework/transposition.html