Projects (4)

This project focuses on supporting the integration of risk assessment approaches into European water legislation to protect both environmental and human health. The goal is to promote a more holistic and integrated approach to water management by improving the identification of pollution sources, strengthening environmental risk assessment practices, and fostering knowledge exchange among EU Member States.

This work package targets to help Member States on the transition to the Circular Economy within the water cycle. Through the share of good practices in urban, industrial and food production water management, in terms of water use and reuse (use of treated wastewaters as an alternative water source) is intended to identify and improve solutions in terms of water use efficiency (taking into account both quality and quantity aspects), that may contribute to zero pollution solutions.

Many rivers, lakes and streams in the EU are far away from the good water status that they should have reached by December 2015 or should reach at the latest by 2027, according to the EU Water Framework Directive. In Germany, for instance, only 10 % of rivers and streams have a good ecological and chemical status, due to pollution by wastewater, agricultural fertilizers and pesticides, heavy canalization, obstruction by hydro dam barriers, as well as urban sprawl and ground sealing in the catchment areas. In order to reduce and reverse these impacts on water status, it is necessary to assess them in an integrated way and carefully prioritise the necessary measures.

The objective of this project was to identify, both from the regulatory that technological point of view, how the water resource is managed today in the industry sector subject to the Integrated Environmental Permitting (IEP) regulation.