Decision 2013/480 - 2013/480/EU: Commission Decision of 20 September 2013 establishing, pursuant to Directive 2000/60/EC, the values of the Member State monitoring system classifications as a result of the intercalibration exercise and repealing Decision 2008/915/EC (notified under document C(2013) 5915) - Main contents

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

L 266/1

Article 4(1)(a)(ii) of Directive 2000/60/EC requires the Member States to protect, enhance and restore all bodies of surface water with the aim of achieving good surface water status at the latest 15 years after the date of entry into force of the Directive, subject to certain derogations in accordance with the provisions laid down in Annex V thereto. Article 4(1)(a)(iii) of Directive 2000/60/EC requires the Member States to protect and enhance all artificial and heavily modified bodies of water, with the aim of achieving good ecological potential and good surface water chemical status at the latest 15 years from the date of entry into force of the Directive, subject to certain derogations, in accordance with the provisions laid down in Annex V thereto. In accordance with Section 1.4.1(i) of Annex V to Directive 2000/60/EC the references to ecological status should be construed as references to ecological potential as regards artificial and heavily modified water bodies.

The intercalibration exercise envisages a harmonised approach to define one of the main environmental objectives of Directive 2000/60/EC, namely good ecological status.

Section 1.4.1 of Annex V to Directive 2000/60/EC provides a process to ensure the comparability between the biological monitoring results of Member States as a central part of the ecological status classification. This requires the Member States’ biological monitoring results and their monitoring system classifications to be compared through an intercalibration network comprised of monitoring sites in each Member State and in each ecoregion of the Union. Directive 2000/60/EC requires the Member States to collect, as appropriate, the necessary information for the sites included in the intercalibration network, in order to enable the assessment of the consistency of the national monitoring system classifications with the normative definitions of Section 1.2 of Annex V to Directive 2000/60/EC and the comparability of the results of monitoring system classifications between the Member States.

In order to carry out the intercalibration exercise Member States are organised in Geographical Intercalibration Groups, consisting of Member States sharing particular surface water body types, as defined in Section 2 of the Annex to Commission Decision 2005/646/EC of 17 August 2005 on the establishment of a register of sites to form the intercalibration network in accordance with Directive 2000/60/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council (2).

Section 1.4.1 of Annex V to Directive 2000/60/EC specifies that the intercalibration exercise is to be carried out at biological element level, comparing the classification results of the national monitoring system for each biological element and for each common surface water body type among Member States in the same Geographical Intercalibration Group, and assessing the consistency of the results with the normative definitions set out in Section 1.2 of Annex V to Directive 2000/60/EC.

The Commission...