Considerations on COM(2022)541 - Urban wastewater treatment (recast) - Main contents
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This page contains a limited version of this dossier in the EU Monitor.
| dossier | COM(2022)541 - Urban wastewater treatment (recast). |
|---|---|
| document | COM(2022)541  |
| date | October 26, 2022 |
(1)Council Directive 91/271/EEC 35 has been substantially amended several times 36 . Since further amendments are to be made, that Directive should be recast in the interests of clarity.
91/271/EEC recital 1 (adapted)
Whereas the Council Resolution of 28 June 1988 on the protection of the North Sea and of other waters in the Community 37 invited the Commission to submit proposals for measures required at Community level for the treatment of urban waste water;
91/271/EEC recital 2 (adapted)
Whereas pollution due to insufficient treatment of waste water in one Member State often influences other Member States' waters; whereas in accordance with Article 130r, action at Community level is necessary;
91/271/EEC recital 3
Whereas to prevent the environment from being adversely affected by the disposal of insufficiently-treated urban waste water, there is a general need for secondary treatment of urban waste water;
91/271/EEC recital 4
Whereas it is necessary in sensitive areas to require more stringent treatment; whereas in some less sensitive areas a primary treatment could be considered appropriate;
91/271/EEC recital 5
Whereas industrial waste water entering collecting systems as well as the discharge of waste water and disposal of sludge from urban waste water treatment plants should be subject to general rules or regulations and/or specific authorizations;
91/271/EEC recital 6
Whereas discharges from certain industrial sectors of biodegradable industrial waste water not entering urban waste water treatment plants before discharge to receiving waters should be subject to appropriate requirements;
91/271/EEC recital 7
Whereas the recycling of sludge arising from waste water treatment should be encouraged; whereas the disposal of sludge to surface waters should be phased out;
91/271/EEC recital 8
Whereas it is necessary to monitor treatment plants, receiving waters and the disposal of sludge to ensure that the environment is protected from the adverse effects of the discharge of waste waters;
91/271/EEC recital 9
Whereas it is important to ensure that information on the disposal of waste water and sludge is made available to the public in the form of periodic reports;
91/271/EEC recital 10
Whereas Member States should establish and present to the Commission national programmes for the implementation of this Directive;
91/271/EEC recital 11
Whereas a Committee should be established to assist the Commission on matters relating to the implementation of this Directive and to its adaptation to technical progress,
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(2)Directive 91/271/EEC sets the legal framework for the collection, treatment and discharge of urban wastewater and the discharge of biodegradable wastewaters from certain industrial sectors. Its objective is to protect the environment from being adversely affected by insufficiently treated urban wastewater discharges. This Directive should continue to pursue the same objective, whilst also contributing to the protection of public health, when for instance urban wastewater is discharged in bathing waters or in water bodies used for the abstraction of drinking water, or when urban wastewater is used as an indicator for parameters relevant for public health. It should also improve access to sanitation and to key information related to the governance of the urban wastewater collection and treatment activities. Finally, this Directive should contribute to the progressive elimination of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from urban wastewater collection and treatment activities, notably by further reducing nitrogen emissions but also by promoting energy efficiency and production of renewable energies, and thus should contribute to the 2050 objective of Climate Neutrality established under Regulation (EU) 2021/1119 of the European Parliament and of the Council 38 .
(3)In 2019, the Commission performed an evaluation of Council Directive 91/271/EEC under the Regulatory Fitness and Performance Programme 39 (the ‘evaluation’). It became apparent from that exercise that certain provisions of the Directive needed to be updated. Three important sources of remaining load of pollution from urban wastewater that could be avoided were identified, namely storm water overflows and urban runoff, potentially mal-functioning individual systems (i.e. systems treating domestic wastewater that is not entering collecting systems) and small agglomerations that are currently not completely covered by Directive 91/271/EEC. Those three sources of pollution constitute a significant pressure on surface water bodies in the Union. Moreover, the report of the evaluation also highlighted the need to improve the transparency and governance of the urban wastewater activities, to seize the opportunity offered by the urban wastewater treatment sector to use its potential for renewable energy development and make tangible steps towards energy neutrality as a contribution to climate neutrality and to harmonise urban wastewater surveillance of health parameters, such as the COVID-19 virus and its variants, as a support for public health action.
(4)Small agglomerations constitute a significant pressure on 11 % of the surface water bodies in the Union 40 . To better tackle the pollution from such agglomerations, and to prevent discharges of untreated urban wastewater into the environment, the scope of this Directive should include all agglomerations of 1 000 population equivalent (p.e.) and above.
(5)In order to ensure effective treatment of urban wastewater before discharge into the environment, all urban wastewaters from agglomerations of 1 000 p.e. and above should be collected in centralised collecting systems. Where such systems are already in place, Member States should ensure that all sources of urban wastewater are connected to them.
(6)Exceptionally, where it can be demonstrated that the establishment of a centralised urban wastewater collecting system would produce no environmental benefit or involve excessive costs, Member States should be allowed to use individual systems to treat urban wastewater, as long as they ensure the same level of treatment as secondary and tertiary treatment. For this purpose, Member States should establish national registers to identify individual systems used on their territory and take all necessary measures to ensure that the design of such systems is adequate, that the systems are properly maintained and that they are subject to a regular compliance control. In particular, Member States should ensure that individual systems used for the collection and storage of urban wastewater are impervious and leak-proof, and that monitoring and inspection of the systems are carried out at regular and fixed intervals.
(7)During rainfall, storm water overflows and urban runoff represent a sizeable remaining source of pollution discharged into the environment. Those emissions are expected to increase due to the combined effects of urbanisation and progressive change of the rain regime linked with climate change. Solutions to reduce that source of pollution should be defined at local level taking into account the specific local conditions. They should be based on an integrated quantitative and qualitative water management in urban areas. Therefore, Member States should ensure that integrated urban wastewater management plans are established at local level for all agglomerations of 100 000 p.e. and above as those agglomerations are responsible for a significant share of the pollution emitted. Furthermore, integrated urban wastewater management plans should also be put in place for agglomeration of between 10 000 p.e. and 100 000 p.e. where storm water overflows or urban runoff poses a risk for the environment or public health.
(8)In order to ensure that the integrated urban wastewater management plans are cost-effective, it is important that they are based on best practices in advanced urban areas. Therefore, the measures to be considered should be based on a thorough analysis of the local conditions and should favour a preventive approach aiming at limiting the collection of unpolluted rain waters and optimising the use of existing infrastructures. With a preference for ‘green’ developments, new grey infrastructures should only be envisaged where absolutely necessary. In order to protect the environment, in particular the coastal and marine environment, and public health from being adversely affected by the discharge of insufficiently treated urban wastewater, secondary treatment should be applied to all discharges of urban wastewater from agglomerations of 1 000 p.e. and above.
(9)The evaluation showed that significant reductions of nitrogen and phosphorus emissions were achieved through the implementation of Directive 91/271/EEC. Nevertheless, urban wastewater treatment plants remain, according to the evaluation, an important pathway of those pollutants into the environment, directly leading to eutrophication of water bodies and seas in the Union. Part of this pollution can be avoided as technological progress and best practices in place show that emission limit values established under Directive 91/271/EEC for nitrogen and phosphorus are outdated and should be strengthened. Tertiary treatment should be systematically imposed to all urban wastewater treatment plants of 100 000 p.e. and above, as such plants represent an important remaining source of nitrogen and phosphorus discharge.
(10)Tertiary treatment should also be mandatory in agglomerations of 10 000 p.e. and above that are discharging in areas subject to, or at risk of, eutrophication. In order to ensure that efforts to limit eutrophication are coordinated at the level of the relevant basins for the whole catchment zone, areas where eutrophication is considered an issue according to currently available data should be listed in this Directive. Additionally, to ensure coherence between relevant Union legislation, Member States should identify other areas subject to, or at risk of, eutrophication on their territory, notably on the basis of data collected under Directive 2000/60/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council 41 , Directive 2008/56/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council 42 and Council Directive 91/676/EEC 43 . The reinforcement of the limit values, a more coherent and inclusive identification of the areas sensitive to eutrophication and the obligation to ensure tertiary treatment for all large facilities will, in combination, contribute to limit eutrophication. Since this will require additional investments on the national level, Member States should be given sufficient time to establish the required infrastructure.
(11)Recent scientific knowledge underpinning several Commission strategies 44 highlight the need to take action to address the issue of micro-pollutants, which are now detected in all waters in the Union. Some of those micropollutants are hazardous for public health and the environment even in small quantities. An additional treatment, i.e. quaternary treatment, should therefore be introduced in order to ensure that a large spectrum of micro-pollutants is removed from urban wastewater. Quaternary treatment should first focus on organic micro-pollutants, which represent a significant part of the pollution and for which removal technologies are already designed. The treatment should be imposed based on the precautionary approach combined with a risk-based approach. Therefore, all urban wastewater treatment plants of 100 000 p.e. and above should provide quaternary treatment, as those facilities represent a significant share of micro-pollutant discharges in the environment and the removal of micro-pollutants by urban wastewater treatment plants at such scale is cost-effective. For agglomerations of between 10 000 p.e. and 100 000 p.e., Member States should be required to apply quaternary treatment to areas identified as sensitive to pollution with micro-pollutants based on clear criteria, which should be specified. Such areas should include locations where treated urban wastewater discharge to water bodies result in low dilution ratios, or where the receiving water bodies are used for the production of drinking water or as bathing waters. In order to avoid the requirement of quaternary treatment for agglomerations of between 10 000 p.e. and 100 000 p.e., Member States should be required to demonstrate the absence of risks to the environment or to public health on the basis of a standardised risk assessment. In order to give Member States enough time to plan and deliver the necessary infrastructures, the requirement of quaternary treatment should progressively apply until 2040 with clear interim objectives.
(12)In order to ensure the continued compliance of discharges from wastewater treatment plants with the requirements for secondary, tertiary and quaternary treatment, samples should be taken in accordance with the requirements of this Directive and those samples should comply with the parametric values that it sets out. In order to take into account possible technical variations in the results from those samples, a maximum number of samples failing to conform to those parametric values should be laid down.
(13)The quaternary treatment necessary to remove micro-pollutants from urban wastewater will imply additional costs, such as costs related to monitoring and new advanced equipment to be installed in certain urban wastewater treatment plants. In order to cover these additional costs and in accordance with the polluter-pays principle expressed in Article 191(2) of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU), it is essential that the producers placing on the Union market products containing substances which, at the end of their life, are found as micro-pollutants in urban wastewaters (‘micro-pollutant substances’) take responsibility for the additional treatment required to remove those substances, generated in the context of their professional activities. A system of extended producer responsibility is the most appropriate means to achieve this, as it would limit the financial impact on the taxpayer and water tariff, while providing an incentive to develop greener products. Pharmaceuticals and cosmetic residues currently represent the main sources of micro-pollutants found in urban wastewater requiring an additional treatment (quaternary treatment). Therefore, extended producer responsibility should apply to those two product groups.
(14)Exonerations from the extended producer responsibility obligations should nevertheless be possible where products are placed on the market in small quantities, i.e. less than 2 tonnes of products, since the additional administrative burden for the producer would in such cases be disproportionate compared to the environmental benefits. Exonerations should also be possible when the producer can demonstrate that no micro-pollutants are generated at the end of life of a product. It might be the case for instance where it can be proven that the residues from a product are rapidly biodegradable in the wastewaters and the environment or not reaching the urban wastewater treatment plants. The Commission should be empowered to adopt implementing acts to establish detailed criteria to identify the products placed on the market that do not generate micro-pollutants in wastewaters at the end of their life. When developing these criteria, the Commission should take into account scientific or other available technical information, including relevant international standards.
(15)In order to avoid possible internal market distortions, minimum requirements for the implementation of the extended producer responsibility should be established in this Directive, while the practical organisation of the system should be decided at national level. The contributions of the producers should be proportionate to the quantities of the products they place on the market and the hazardouness of their residues. The contributions should cover, but not exceed, the costs for the monitoring activities for micro-pollutants, the collection, reporting and impartial verification of statistics on the quantities and hazardouness of products placed on the market, and the application of the quaternary treatment to urban wastewater in an efficient manner and in accordance with this Directive. Since urban wastewater is treated collectively, it is appropriate to introduce a requirement for producers to join a centralised organisation which can implement their obligations under the extended producer responsibility on their behalf.
(16)The evaluation has also shown that the wastewater treatment sector offers the opportunity to significantly reduce its own energy consumption and to produce renewable energy, for example by better use of the available surfaces in urban wastewater treatment plants for solar energy production or by producing biogas from sludge. The evaluation also illustrated that, without clear legal obligations, only partial progress can be expected in this sector. In this context, Member States should be required to ensure that the total annual energy used by all urban wastewater treatment plants on their national territory treating a load of 10 000 p.e. and above does not exceed the production of energy from renewable sources as defined in Article 2(1) of Directive (EU) 2018/2001 of the European Parliament and of the Council 45 , by those urban wastewater treatment plants. That objective should be progressively met with interim targets by 31 December 2040. Reaching this energy neutrality target will contribute to reduce the avoidable greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the sector by 46 %, while supporting the achievement of the 2050 climate neutrality objectives and related national and Union objectives, [such as the objectives set out in Regulation (EU) 2018/842 of the European Parliament and of the Council 46 . Encouraging EU-based biogas or solar energy production while enhancing energy efficiency measures in line with the Energy Efficiency First principle 47 , which means taking utmost account of cost-efficient energy efficiency measures in shaping energy policy and making relevant investment decisions, will also help reduce the Union energy dependence, one of the objectives expressed in the Commission 'Repower EU' Plan 48 . It is also in line with Directive (EU) 2018/844 of the European Parliament and of the Council 49 and with Directive (EU) 2018/2001 in which urban wastewater treatment sites are qualified as ‘go-to' areas for renewables, meaning a location designated as particularly suitable for the installation of plants for the production of energy from renewable sources. In order to reach the objective of energy neutrality via optimal measures for each urban wastewater treatment plant and for the collection system, Member States should ensure that energy audits are carried out in accordance with Article 8 of Directive 2012/27/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council 50 every four years. Those audits should include an identification of the potential for cost-effective use or production of renewable energy following the criteria set out in Annex VI to Directive 2012/27/EU.
(17)Since the transboundary nature of water pollution requires cooperation between neighbouring Member States or third countries in addressing such pollution and identifying measures to tackle its source, Member States should be required to inform each other or the third country if significant water pollution originating from urban wastewater discharges in one Member State or third country impacts or is likely to impact the water quality of another Member State or third country. Such information should be immediate in case of incidental pollution significantly affecting downstream water bodies. The Commission should be informed and, if necessary, participate in meetings at the request of Member States. It is also important to tackle the transboundary pollution from third countries sharing the same water bodies with some of the Member States. For the purpose of dealing pollution coming or arriving in third countries, the cooperation and coordination with third countries may be carried out in the framework of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) Water Convention 51 or other relevant regional Conventions such as the Regional Seas or Rivers Conventions.
(18)In order to ensure the protection of the environment and human health, Member States should ensure that the urban wastewater treatment plants built to comply with the requirements of this Directive are designed, constructed, operated, and maintained to ensure sufficient performance under all normal local climatic conditions.
(19)Urban wastewater treatment plants also receive non-domestic wastewater, including industrial wastewater, which can contain a range of pollutants not explicitly covered by Directive 91/271/EEC, such as heavy metals, micro-plastics, micro-pollutants and other chemicals. In most instances, there is a poor understanding and knowledge of such pollution which could deteriorate the functioning of the treatment process and contribute to the pollution of the receiving waters, but also prevent the recovery of sludge and the re-use of treated wastewater. Member States should therefore regularly monitor and report on such non-domestic pollution that enters the urban wastewater treatment plants and is discharged into water bodies. To prevent pollution from non-domestic wastewater discharges at source, releases from industries or enterprises connected to collecting systems should be subject to prior authorisation. In order to ensure that collecting systems and urban wastewater treatment plants are technically capable of receiving and treating the incoming pollution, the operators who manage urban wastewater treatment plants receiving non-domestic wastewater should be consulted before those permits are issued and should be able to consult the issued permits in order to be able to adapt their treatment processes. Where non-domestic pollution is identified in the incoming waters, Member States should take appropriate measures to reduce pollution at source, by enhancing the monitoring of pollutants in collecting systems so that the pollution sources can be identified and, where necessary, by reviewing the authorisations provided to relevant, connected urban wastewater treatment plants. The water resources of the Union are increasingly under pressure, resulting in permanent or temporary water scarcity in some areas of the Union. The Union’s ability to respond to the increasing pressures on water resources could be improved through a wider reuse of treated urban wastewater, limiting freshwater abstraction from surface and groundwater bodies. Therefore, the reuse of treated urban wastewater should be encouraged and applied whenever appropriate, whilst taking into account the need to ensure that the objectives of good ecological and chemical status of the receiving bodies, as defined in Directive 2000/60/EC, are met. The reinforcement of the requirements for the treatment of urban wastewater, and the actions to better monitor, track and reduce pollution at source, will have impacts on the quality of treated urban wastewater, and will therefore support water reuse. Where water reuse serves the purpose of agricultural irrigation, it should be carried out in accordance with Regulation (EU) 2020/741 of the European Parliament and of the Council 52 .
(20)In order to ensure a proper implementation of this Directive and notably the respect of the emission limit values, it is important to monitor discharges of treated urban wastewater into the environment. The monitoring should be done through the establishment at national level of a mandatory prior authorisation system in order to discharge the treated urban wastewater into the environment. In addition, in order to prevent unintentional discharges of plastic biomedia the environment from urban wastewater treatment plants using this technique, it is essential to include in the discharge authorisations specific obligations to continuously monitor and prevent such discharges.
(21)In order to ensure the protection of the environment, direct discharges of biodegradable non-domestic wastewater into the environment from certain industrial sectors should be subject to prior authorisation on national level and appropriate requirements. Those requirements should ensure that direct discharges from certain industrial sectors are subject to secondary, tertiary and quaternary treatment as necessary for the protection of human health and the environment.
(22)According to Article 168(1) TFEU, Union action complements national policies and is to be directed towards improving public health and preventing diseases. In order to ensure optimal use of relevant public health data from urban wastewaters, urban wastewater surveillance should be set up and used for preventive or early warning purposes, for instance in the detection of specific viruses in urban wastewater as a signal of the emergence of epidemics or pandemics. Member States should establish a permanent dialogue and coordination between competent authorities responsible for public health and competent authorities responsible for urban wastewater management. In the context of that coordination, a list of parameters relevant for public health to be monitored in urban wastewaters should be established, as well as the frequency and location of the sampling. This approach will take advantage of and complement other Union initiatives in the field of public health protection, such as environmental monitoring that includes wastewater surveillance 53 . Based on information gathered during the COVID-19 pandemic and experience gained from the implementation of the Commission Recommendation on a common approach to establish a systematic surveillance of SARS-CoV-2 and its variants in wastewaters in the EU 54 (the ‘recommendation’), Member States should be required to monitor health parameters related to SARS-CoV-2 and its variants on a regular basis. In order to ensure that harmonised methods are used, Member States should, to the extent possible, use sampling and analysis methods set out in the recommendation for the monitoring of SARS-CoV-2 and its variants.
(23)The Union recognises the importance of tackling the issue of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and adopted in 2017 the European One Health Action Plan against AMR 55 . According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), wastewater is recognised and documented as major sources of antimicrobial agents and their metabolites, as well as antimicrobial-resistant bacteria and their genes. In order to increase the knowledge on the main sources of AMR, it is necessary to introduce a monitoring obligation for the presence of AMR in urban wastewaters to further develop our scientific knowledge and potentially take adequate action in the future.
(24)In order to protect the environment and human health, Member States should identify the risks caused by urban wastewaters management. On the basis of that identification, and where necessary to comply with the requirements of the Union water legislation, Member States should take more stringent measures for the urban wastewater collection and treatment than the measures required to comply with the minimum requirements set out in this Directive. Depending on the situation, those more stringent measures can include, inter alia, the establishment of collecting systems, the development of integrated urban wastewater management plans or the application of secondary, tertiary or quaternary treatment to urban wastewater for agglomerations or urban wastewater treatment plants that do not reach the p.e. thresholds triggering the application of the standard requirements. They can also include more advanced treatment than the treatment necessary to respect the minimum requirements or disinfection of treated urban wastewaters necessary to comply with Directive 2006/7/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council 56 .
(25)Sustainable Development Goal 6 and the associated target requiring Member States to ‘achieve access to adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all and end open defecation, paying special attention to the needs of women and girls and those in vulnerable situations’ by 2030. 57 Furthermore, Principle 20 of the European Pillar of Social Rights 58 states that everyone has the right to access essential services of good quality, including water and sanitation. Against that background, and in accordance with the recommendations in the WHO Guidelines for Sanitation and Health 59 and the provisions of the Protocol on Water and Health 60 Member States should tackle the issue of access to sanitation at national level. That should be done through actions aimed at improving access to sanitation for all, for example by setting up sanitation facilities in public spaces, as well as by encouraging the availability of appropriate sanitation facilities in public administrations and public buildings free of charge and\or making them affordable to all. Sanitation facilities should allow the safe management and disposal of human urine, faeces and menstrual blood. They should be safely managed, which implies that they should be accessible to all at all times, including for people with particular needs, such as children, older persons, persons with disabilities and homeless people, that they should be placed in a location that ensures minimal risk to the safety of users, and that they should be hygienically and technically safe to use. Such facilities should also be sufficient in number to ensure that the needs of people are met and waiting times are not unreasonably long.
(26)The specific situation of minority cultures, such as Roma and Travellers, whether settled or not, and in particular their lack of access to sanitation, was acknowledged in the Communication from the Commission of 7 October 2020 ‘A Union of Equality: EU Roma strategic framework for equality, inclusion and participation’, which calls for increasing effective equal access to essential services. Overall, it is appropriate that Member States pay particular attention to vulnerable and marginalised groups by taking the necessary measures to improve access to sanitation for those groups. It is important that the identification of those groups is coherent with Article 16(1) of Directive (EU) 2020/2184 of the European Parliament and of the Council 61 . Measures to improve access to sanitation by vulnerable and marginalised groups might include providing sanitation facilities in public spaces for free or for a low service fee, improving or maintaining the connection to adequate systems to collect urban wastewater, and raising awareness of the nearest sanitation facilities.
(27)According to the EU Human Rights Guidelines on Safe Drinking Water and Sanitation 62 , particular attention should be given to the needs of women and girls, as they are particularly at risk and exposed to attacks, sexual and gender-based violence, harassment and other threats to their safety when accessing sanitation facilities outside their homes. This is in line with the Council Conclusions on Water Diplomacy 63 , which reaffirm the importance of integrating a gender perspective into water diplomacy. Therefore, Member States should pay particular attention to women and girls as being a vulnerable group and should take the necessary measures to improve or maintain a safe access to sanitation for them.
(28)The evaluation concluded that sludge management could be improved to better align it with the principles of the circular economy and of the waste hierarchy as defined in Article 4 of Directive 2008/98/EC. The actions to better monitor and reduce pollution at source from non-domestic discharges will help improving the quality of the sludge produced and ensure its safe use in agriculture. In order to ensure a proper and safe recovery of nutrients, including the critical substance phosphorus, from the sludge, minimum recovery rates should be defined at Union level.
(29)Additional monitoring is necessary to verify compliance with the new requirements concerning micro-pollutants, non-domestic pollution, energy neutrality, GHG emissions, storm water overflows and urban runoff. To verify the performance of the quaternary treatment concerning the reduction of micro-pollutants in urban wastewater discharges, it is sufficient to monitor a limited set of representative micro-pollutants. The monitoring frequencies should be aligned to the current best practices, as currently practiced in Switzerland. To remain cost-effective, those obligations should be adapted to the size of the urban wastewater treatment plants and of the agglomerations. The monitoring will also contribute to provide data for the overall Environmental Monitoring Framework as set up under the 8th Environmental Action Programme 64 , and more specifically feed the Zero Pollution Monitoring Framework underpinning it 65 .
(30)In order to reduce administrative burden and better use the possibilities offered by digitalisation, the reporting on the implementation of the Directive should be improved and simplified by removing the obligation for Member States to report every two years to the Commission and for the Commission to publish bi-yearly reports. It should be replaced by a requirement for Member States to improve, with the support of the European Environment Agency (EEA), the existing national standardised data sets established under Directive 91/271/EEC, and to regularly update them. Permanent access to the national databases should be provided to the Commission and the EEA. In order to ensure complete information on the application of this Directive, the data sets should include information on compliance of urban wastewater treatment plants with the treatment requirements (pass/fail, loads and concentration of pollutants discharged), on the level of achievement of the objectives of energy neutrality, on GHG emissions of the treatment plants above 10 000 p.e. and on measures taken by the Member States in the context of storm water overflows/ urban runoff, access to sanitation and treatment by individual systems. Moreover, full coherence with Regulation (EC) 166/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council 66 should be ensured to optimise the use of the data, as well as to support full transparency.
(31)In order to ensure a timely and proper implementation of this Directive, it is essential that Member States establish a national implementation programme including long-term programming of the required investments accompanied with a financing strategy. Those national programmes should be reported to the Commission. To limit administrative burden, that requirement should not apply to Member States showing a level of compliance of more than 95 % with regard to the main obligations to collect and treat wastewater.
(32)The urban wastewater collection and treatment sector is specific, operating as a captive market, with public and small enterprises being connected to the collecting system without having the possibility to choose their operators. It is therefore important to ensure public access to operators’ key performance indicators, such as the level of treatment achieved, the costs of treatment, the energy used and produced, and the related GHG emissions and carbon footprint. In order to make the public more aware of the implications of urban wastewater treatment, key information on the annual wastewater collection and treatment costs for each household should be provided in an easily accessible manner, for instance on the invoices, while other detailed information should be accessible online, on a website of the operator or the competent authority.
(33)Directive 2003/4/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council 67 guarantees the right of access to environmental information in the Member States in line with the 1998 Aarhus Convention on Access to Information, Public Participation in Decision-Making and Access to Justice in Environmental Matters (the ‘Aarhus Convention’). The Aarhus Convention encompasses broad obligations related both to making environmental information available upon request and actively disseminating such information. It is important that the provisions of this Directive related to access to information and data-sharing arrangements complement that Directive, by establishing the obligation to make available to the public online information on the collection and treatment of urban wastewater in a user-friendly manner, without creating a separate legal regime.
(34)The effectiveness of this Directive and its aim of protecting public health in the context of the Union’s environment policy require that natural or legal persons, or where appropriate their duly constituted organisations, be able to rely on it in legal proceedings and that the national courts be able to take this Directive into consideration as an element of Union law in order, inter alia, to review decisions of a national authority where appropriate. In addition, according to settled case law of the Court of Justice, under the principle of sincere cooperation laid down in Article 4(3) of the Treaty on European Union (TEU), it is for the courts of the Member States to ensure judicial protection of a person’s rights under Union law. Furthermore, Article 19(1) TEU requires Member States to provide remedies sufficient to ensure effective judicial protection in the fields covered by Union law. In addition, in accordance with the Aarhus Convention, members of the public concerned should have access to justice in order to contribute to the protection of the right to live in an environment which is adequate for personal health and well-being.
(35)To adapt this Directive to scientific and technical progress, the power to adopt acts in accordance with Article 290 TFEU should be delegated to the Commission in respect of amending certain parts of the Annexes with regard to the requirements for the secondary, tertiary and quaternary treatment and the requirements for specific authorisations for discharges of non-domestic wastewater into collecting systems and urban wastewater treatment plants and in respect of supplementing this Direcrive by establishing minimum reuse and recycling rates for phosphorus and nitrogen from sludge. It is of particular importance that the Commission carries out appropriate consultations during its preparatory work, including at expert level, and that those consultations be conducted in accordance with the principles laid down in the Interinstitutional Agreement on Better Law-Making. In particular, to ensure equal participation in the preparation of delegated acts, the European Parliament and the Council receive all documents at the same time as Member States’ experts, and their experts systematically have access to meetings of Commission expert groups dealing with the preparation of delegated acts.
(36)In order to ensure uniform conditions for the implementation of this Directive, implementing powers should be conferred on the Commission for the adoption of standards for the design of individual systems, for the adoption of monitoring and assessment methods for the indicators of the quaternary treatment, for the establishment of common conditions and criteria for the application of the exoneration for certain products from extended producer responsibility, for establishing methodologies to support the development of integrated urban wastewater management plans and to measure antimicrobial resistance and micro-plastics in urban wastewater, and for the adoption of the format of, and modalities for, presenting the information to be provided by Member States and compiled by the EEA on the implementation of this Directive. Those powers should be exercised in accordance with Regulation (EU) No 182/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council 68 .
(37)Member States should lay down rules on penalties applicable to infringements of national provisions adopted pursuant to this Directive and should take all measures necessary to ensure that they are implemented. The penalties should be effective, proportionate and dissuasive, taking into account specificities of Small and Medium Enterprises.
(38)Pursuant to the Interinstitutional Agreement on Better Law-Making 69 , the Commission should carry out an evaluation of this Directive within a certain period of time from the date set for its transposition. That evaluation should be based on experience gained and data collected during the implementation of this Directive, on any available WHO recommendations, and on relevant scientific, analytical, and epidemiological data. In the evaluation, particular attention should be given to the possible necessity to adapt of the list of products to be covered by extended producer responsibility according to the evolution of the range of products placed on the market, the improvement of knowledge on the presence of micro-pollutants in the wastewaters and their impacts on public health and the environment, and data from the new monitoring obligations on micro-pollutants in the inlets and outlets of the urban wastewater treatment plants.
(39)Directive 91/271/EEC provides for specific deadlines for Mayotte due to its inclusion in 2014 as an outermost region within the meaning of Article 349 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. Therefore, the application of the obligations to establish collecting systems and apply secondary treatment to urban wastewater from agglomeration of 2 000 p.e. and above should be deferred with respect to Mayotte.
(40)In order to ensure the continuity of the protection of the environment, it is important that Member States maintain at least the current level of tertiary treatment until the new requirements for the reduction of phosphorus and nitrogen become applicable. Therefore, Article 5 of Council Directive 91/271/EC should continue to apply until those new requirements become applicable.
(41)Since the objectives of this Directive, namely to protect the environment and public health, to progress towards climate neutrality of urban wastewater collection and treatment activities, to improve access to sanitation and to ensure a regular surveillance of parameters relevant to public health, cannot be sufficiently achieved by the Member States but can rather, by reason of the scale and effects of the action, be better achieved at Union level, the Union may adopt measures, in accordance with the principle of subsidiarity as set out in Article 5 TEU. In accordance with the principle of proportionality as set out in that Article, this Directive does not go beyond what is necessary in order to achieve those objectives.
(42)The obligation to transpose this Directive into national law should be confined to those provisions which represent a substantive amendment as compared to the earlier Directive. The obligation to transpose the provisions which are unchanged arises under the earlier Directive.
(43)This Directive should be without prejudice to the obligations of the Member States relating to the time-limits for the transposition into national law of the Directives set out in Annex [VII], Part B,
91/271/EEC (adapted)
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