Commission says more than a hundred urban waste water treatment plants do not meet EU standards, and many sensitive eutrophication areas have not been identified

Luxembourg, 23/09/2002 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission is taking France to the European Court of Justice on the grounds that according to information supplied by France, more than a hundred urban waste water treatment plants fail to meet standards set out in Directive 91/271/EEC by the deadline of 31 December 1998. Only the agglomerations of Vichy, Aix en Provence and Mâcon meet the standards out of 130 criticised agglomerations, notes the Commission. The water treatment facilities of the following cities will not meet the standards until a future date: Boulogne-sur-Mer (2005), Clermont-Ferrand (2004), Saint-Etienne (2005), Mulhouse (2003), Nancy (autumn 2002), Dijon (2005), Montpellier (2004), Tarare (2003), Villefranche sur Saône (2004), Vitrolles (2005) and Auxerre (2004). Nothing has been done or planned for the other places, notes the Commission.

The second grievance vis-à-vis France is failure to identify certain areas as sensitive areas with respect to eutrophication, only notifying areas where it considers eutrophication to be established (not even notifying all of these areas either, notes the Commission). The Commission adds that the following should have been notified as sensitive areas or areas already subject to eutrophication:

• In Seine-Normandie: the Seine bay, the Seine and its tributaries downstream from its confluence with the Andelle;
• In Loire-Bretagne: Lorient harbour, the Elorn estuary, the bay of Douarnenez, Concarneau bay, the Gulf of Morbihan, the bay of Vilaine and the Sèvre-Nirotaise;
• In Artois-Picardie: the coastal waters and, for mainland waters, the hydrographic system between the canalised Aa and the Escaut on the one hand and the Belgian border on the other hand, the Scarpe downstream from Arras, the Lens Canal downstream from Lens and the whole of the Somme;
• In Rhône-Méditerranée-Corse: River Vistre and Thau lake.

Directive 91/271/EEC defines eutrophication as water with excess levels of nitrogen and/or phosphorus nutrients that lead to accelerated growth of algae and weed causing undesirable changes to the organisms living in the water in question and a deterioration of water quality.

France has been found guilty of several environmental offences. In June 2002, the Court of Justice found it guilty of failing to identify the Seine Bay as being subject to eutrophication through agricultural nitrates (see Europe of 29 June, p.15).

On 8 March 2001, the Court found France guilty of having done virtually nothing to combat nitrate pollution in Brittany (see the report by the French Court of Auditors of February 2002 on the pollution of drinking water from nitrates, leading to "mediocre, if not catastrophic" drinking water, Europe of 17 March 2001).

In July 2002, France was condemned for bad management of its household refuse incinerators (see Europe of 6 July, p.16).