1. Commission report on Art. 8 WFD Monitoring programmes
WFD CIS WG C on Groundwater
Prague, 28 April 2009
Balázs Horváth
European Commission, DG Environment

2. Legal basis
Article 18.3 of the Water Framework Directive (2000/60/EC):
3. The Commission shall also publish a report on progress in implementation based on the summary reports that Member States submit under Article 15(2), and submit it to the European Parliament and the Member States…

3. Summarize the information received by MS
COM aim with the report
Summarize the information received by MS
Draw a European wide picture of the status of monitoring
Come to conclusions, analyse strengths and weaknesses of MS
Assist the correct implementation of WFD

4. Structure of the report
Commission Report: 6 pages (all languages)
Commission Staff Working Document (ca. 50 pages, EN only)
Annexes (ca. 180 pages, EN only)
Questionnaire used for compliance checking
MS annex with factual information and the results of the assessment

5. Table of contents CSWD 1. Introduction
2. Monitoring Requirements of the WFD
3. Methodology for the Compliance Check
Results of the Assessment of Member States' Monitoring Programmes
4.1. Communication and Completeness of the Reports
4.2 Overview of Monitoring Networks in the European Union
4.3 Monitoring Programmes on Surface Waters
4.4. Monitoring Programmes on Groundwater
Results in International River Basin Districts
Conclusions
6.1 Reporting
6.2 Monitoring
Annex 1: Questionnaire for Compliance Checking of Monitoring Reports
Annex 2: Information on the Monitoring Programmes of the Member States

6. 4.1 Communication To date, 26 Member States have reported.
24 Member States have reported through WISE.
Date of reporting of the Member States
Reporting deadline: 22 March 2007

7. 4.2 Overview of EU27 Groundwater Chemical status surveillance 31.019
Number of monitoring stations
Chemical status
surveillance
operational
Quantitative status
Total
- dense spread in central Europe and
significantly fewer monitoring stations
in the Northern countries.
- trend to have denser networks in those
areas, in which groundwater is used
for drinking water or other purposes.

8. 4.4 Groundwater monitoring
Total number of monitoring stations for quantitative and for chemical groundwater monitoring
significant differences across Member States in the approach of establishing groundwater monitoring.

9. 4.4 Groundwater monitoring
Number of groundwater monitoring stations per 1000 km² of Member State land area for quantitative and chemical monitoring
density of the network depends on the size of the country and the intensity of groundwater use and on the types of uses

10. 4.4 Groundwater monitoring
Percentage of groundwater bodies included in quantitative monitoring
the percentage depends significantly on the delineation of groundwater bodies as some countries have performed a very detailed delineation resulting in a large number of groundwater bodies

11. 4.4 Groundwater monitoring
Number and percentage of groundwater bodies with 0, 1, 2-5, 6-10, and 11 and more monitoring sites for quantitative monitoring (data from 23 Member States)
Almost 60% of the groundwater bodies do not have quantitative monitoring.

12. 4.4 Groundwater monitoring
Percentage of groundwater bodies included in chemical surveillance monitoring
percentages are influenced by the delineation of groundwater bodies and some countries used a more targeted approach than others

13. 4.4 Groundwater monitoring
Number of water bodies with operational monitoring in relation to the number of water bodies at risk of reaching the environmental objectives, as reported by the Member State under Article 5 WFD. "Number GWB" are the number of water bodies included in operational monitoring.
Some of the MS has not established operational monitoring but has an extended groundwater chemical surveillance monitoring network

14. Annex 2: MS Information Outline Information supplied Facts and figures
Surface Water Monitoring Programmes
Design of Monitoring Programmes
Development of Biological Assessment Methods
Selection of quality elements and frequency of monitoring
Groundwater Monitoring Programmes
Further information
Summary of technical assessment: strengths and weaknesses

15. Annex 2: MS Information Example INFORMATION SUPPLIED
Reporting through WISE; completeness of reporting (e.g. for all river basin districts, for all water categories); additionals reports, web links
Example

16. Annex 2: MS Information
Example

17. Annex 2: MS Information
Example

18. 6. Conclusions 1 Reporting
Gaps remain in certain RBDs and in certain water categories
Improvements needed on quality of reporting. Some make good use of the agreed format, others provided very general information, relied heavily on secondary information or provided inactive web links
The desired flexibility in reporting formats has lead to a complicated reporting structure. This has made the systematic assessment quite difficult
There is need to strike a better balance between flexibility and complexity in the reporting schemas

19. 6. Conclusions 2 Monitoring
Overall, there is a good monitoring effort across EU, > stations for surface water and groundwater
In general, the provisions of Art. 8 and Annex V have been applied, but there is room for improvement in some MS in particular as regards the application of the concepts of surveillance, operational and investigative monitoring
Extensive use of grouping of water bodies for monitoring.
Monitoring should not be seen just as an expensive burden but rather as an important tool for cost-effectiveness in river basin management.
The reporting of river basin management plans will allow the Commission to assess in a more comprehensive way the results delivered by the monitoring programmes

20. 6. Conclusions 3
Groundwater
The information reported by the Member States was quite general in many cases and it relied heavily on secondary reports.
The majority of Member States have updated their existing monitoring programmes for groundwater to take into account the objectives of WFD. Several of them have, however, indicated that this process had not been completed.
In all but one Member States the reporting was centralised, and a harmonised approach seems to have been applied across the different river basin districts.

21. Web access to the report
water-framework/implrep2007/index_en.htm

22. …Guidance document on groundwater status and trend assessment:
New web access to…
…Guidance document on groundwater status and trend assessment:
water-framework/groundwater/scienc_tec/cis/pdf/
gw_trend_assessment.pdf
…19 language versions of brochure on groundwater protection:
water-framework/groundwater.html