The European Commission published, on Friday 22 May, a guidance for implementation of the Water Framework Directive (WFD, Directive 2000/60/EC) regarding the granting of permits for new projects and existing activities, with a particular focus on the mining sector.
This document is intended to harmonise practices among Member States and reduce uncertainties linked to environmental assessments. The Commission emphasises that it does not add to, amend or replace existing provisions.
The guidance focuses on the chemical status of surface and groundwater, an area where interpretation difficulties are most frequent.
As regards mixing zones, it should be noted that Article 4 of Directive 2008/105/EC (environmental quality standards in the field of water policy) allows Member States to delineate zones adjacent to discharge points.
In these zones, an exceedance of environmental quality standards (EQS) may be allowed, provided that the EQS are complied with in the water body as a whole, outside the mixing zone, that all feasible and non-disproportionate mitigation measures are implemented (notably best available techniques under the Industrial Emissions Directive, IED), and that sensitive areas, such as drinking water abstraction points, are protected. This flexibility, already applied by certain States, is encouraged for priority substances and, by analogy, for river basin specific pollutants.
As regards natural background concentrations and bioavailability, for naturally occurring substances (such as nickel or cobalt), Member States may subtract natural background concentrations from assessments before comparison with the EQS for surface waters, take account of bioavailability (influenced by pH or water hardness) in order to avoid assessments that are overly strict or distorted, and incorporate these parameters when setting threshold values for groundwater.
New exemptions. Directive 2026/805, establishing a framework for Community action in the field of water policy, introduces Articles 4(7a) and 4(7b) into WFD, allowing Member States to authorise projects liable to lead to a deterioration in a water body’s chemical status, under strict conditions: the deterioration must be indirect and no deterioration resulting from direct discharges of pollutants is authorised.
Extensions and adjusted objectives. For existing activities, including mines, States may extend compliance deadlines beyond 2027, until 2039 or later, if justified by natural conditions, or set less stringent environmental objectives where no feasible measure makes it possible to achieve good status and costs would be disproportionate.
Member States have until December 2027 to transpose amendments resulting from Directive 2026/805. The guidance applies by analogy to other strategic sectors, such as renewable energy, semiconductors and net-zero technologies (innovations and equipment designed to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions).
Link to document: https://aeur.eu/f/m07 (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)