Changes from report parliamentary committee draft to plenary report

Added68. Calls on the Member States to create natural water reserves based on up-to-date assessments of climate risks to protect critical water supplies and their catchments, and taking into consideration the environmental and socio-economic impact of developing such reserves; points out that such natural water reserves would complement the WFD’s requirement for Member States to identify water bodies used for drinking water abstraction, making sure they meet the objectives set out in Article 4 WFD and in the Drinking Water Directive, and would ensure their necessary protection; notes that such natural water reserves already exist under different forms in various Member States; stresses that assistance should be given to Member States or local and regional governments to help them develop natural water reserves;

Added69. Notes the potential of retention infrastructure as an example of water generation systems created using the best available, cost-effective techniques that have the lowest environmental impact, including by means of wastewater reuse or rainwater collection, in order to reduce the risks of droughts and floods, increase water security and foster circularity, water reclamation and reuse; believes that water retention facilities may be useful tools provided that they are authorised by local or national authorities under clear conditions, including the capacity of local groundwater to sustain such activities and the need for farmers accessing the water resource to adapt their practices to more sustainable practices, in particular in terms of water needs and water quality; calls on the Commission to use its available tools, including financial support, to streamline this approach among the Member States;

Added70. Deplores the unlawful or intentional abstraction of water, which is likely to cause substantial damage to water bodies; calls for strong dissuasive measures to be applied, including through the criminal law, to protect the ecological status or the ecological potential of surface water bodies or of the quantitative status of groundwater bodies; notes that additional support for training and knowledge transfer for national enforcement capacities is needed;

Added71. Notes the important cross-cutting role of nature-based solutions in addressing the challenges of the triple planetary crisis and restoring the natural water cycle; calls on the Commission and the Member States to prioritise, taking into account the environmental and socio-economic impacts, the deployment of nature-based solutions for water resilience in their policy actions and recommendations, such as the re-wetting of wetlands and peatlands to increase ground water availability and surrounding soil moisture, the restoration and protection of floodplains, natural water retention measures, revegetation as a barrier against floods, and rainwater conservation, in order to strengthen water availability, mitigate climate change risks and support long-term resilience for communities, businesses and food production; underlines that, in addition to nature-based solutions, complementary investment in engineering solutions remains necessary to ensure successful climate adaptation and water resilience in the long term;

Funding and pricing

Change 14

Removed21. Emphasises that the EWRS should ensure adequate funding from public and private sources in order to support resilient water infrastructure, sustainable water management, data collection, research, nature-based solutions and the uptake of water-efficient technologies, as well as to uphold nature restoration and biodiversity;

Added72. Notes that nature-based solutions and natural water retention measures have the potential to restore groundwater levels and support ecological flows while reducing water-related risks from water scarcity, floods and droughts; notes that in flood management, nature-based solutions cannot usually replace existing solutions and may not be effective for the most extreme events; points out, however, that nature-based solutions can enhance the effectiveness and operable life of grey infrastructure by increasing water absorption capacity, reducing water velocity and regulating peak flows; reiterates, in this regard, that the effectiveness of nature-based solutions is context-specific and must be adapted to the local situation; emphasises in this regard that a ‘one solution that fits all’ does not exist;

Removed22. Calls on the Commission to create a separate and dedicated fund as a single EU access point for water resilience within the upcoming MFF;

Added73. Stresses the need to provide financial support for sustainable innovative methods and solutions, while having due regard to public-private partnerships;

Removed23. Recalls that the lack of a dedicated water funding line or binding funding targets within the current MFF limits the EU’s capacity to direct targeted investments towards essential water resilience measures;

Added74. Stresses, in the context of climate adaptation, the importance of healthy soils in ensuring water security and circularity; emphasises that the natural water retention of soils must be improved through measures to enhance soil health, minimising carbon losses, as well as actions at the level of the water body, such as the stabilisation of riverbanks, including through re-naturalisation, and the restoration of the retention capacities of aquifers;

Removed24. Regrets that the application of the cost recovery principle remains low to non-existent in several Member States; calls on Member States and their regional authorities to implement adequate water pricing policies and fully apply the cost recovery principle for both environmental and resource costs;

Added75. Notes that thoroughly designed forest management measures can improve watershed health, regulate water flow and reduce drought and flood stress, given the essential role of trees and forests in water cycle regulation, through their ability to purify water, increase the availability of water resources and improve soil moisture retention; proposes that this be duly considered when the Commission, in cooperation with the Member States, develops Union disaster resilience goals and that it be considered in the development and refinement of disaster risk management and contingency planning; highlights the need, in this regard, for more research, data collection, innovation and funding to support land managers in preventing the impact of environmental stressors such as drought floods and diminishing watershed function;

RemovedDigitalisation and innovation

Added76. Recognises that urban areas are increasingly vulnerable to water-related climate risks such as flooding, water shortages and heat stress; calls for the integration of urban water resilience planning into climate adaptation strategies, including investment in green roofs, permeable infrastructure, rainwater harvesting and storm water retention systems, as well as measures aimed at increasing green and blue spaces in urban areas, in order to mitigate extreme weather impacts and to reduce the risks to human life and property; calls further for the maintenance of, and regained access to, urban waterways in cities;

Removed25. Stresses the potential of digitalisation and artificial intelligence in improving the management and monitoring of bodies of water;

Added77. Emphasises that the EWRS should ensure adequate funding from public and private sources in order to support the modernisation, upgrading, adaptation and maintenance of resilient water infrastructure, sustainable water management, data collection, research, effective monitoring, digitalisation, upskilling, nature-based solutions, the development and the uptake of innovative water-efficient technologies, as well as to ensure environmental and socio-economic sustainability in line with the goals set by the new European Competitiveness Compass;

Removed26. Calls on the Commission, Member States and water providers to mainstream digitalisation and enhance the use of management and metering data for evidence-based decision-making at both the regulatory and consumption level; calls for digitally enabled water technologies to enable distance monitoring and reporting on water quality, leakages, use and resources;

Added78. Calls on the Commission to create a separate and dedicated fund for water resilience within the upcoming MFF; believes that specific financial mechanisms should also be established within the European Regional Development Fund and the Cohesion Fund to support water-smart technologies and water investment; strongly believes that, in the interim, water should be prioritised in existing funding frameworks, including the Cohesion Fund; stresses that EU funding mechanisms must incorporate considerations of social equity and affordability, in particular in the context of providing water services to the population, ensuring support for Member States and citizens with greater financial constraints and specific realities, while meeting water management obligations; highlights the importance of adjusting existing funding, subsidies and financing streams related to water management and other related land uses, moving away from outdated engineering solutions to innovative ones, as well as nature-based solutions or a combination thereof;

Removed27. Notes that better data and data analysis are key to evidence-based decision-making and the swift identification of small changes in water quality that could present a threat to bodies of water, together with the evaluation of best practices and identification of the most cost-effective measures;

Added79. Calls for targeted funding, via Horizon Europe and the EIP-AGRI, for field trials on the water relations of different cropping systems; calls for the recognition of the role of women in water policies and for specific funding to be identified to promote their access to agriculture;

RemovedCross-border cooperation

Added80. Recalls that the lack of dedicated funding for water or binding funding targets within the current MFF limits the EU’s capacity to direct targeted investment towards essential water resilience measures, including infrastructure modernisation, innovation, climate adaptation measures and the implementation of nature-based solutions, and thus its competitive capacity, as the absence of a water balance creates an additional burden for the economy of the regions; notes that outermost and mountainous regions and islands in the EU are particularly struggling to access funding or public-private partnerships to support local and regional investment in water management and infrastructure;

Removed28. Stresses the need for a comprehensive EWRS that fosters cross-border cooperation, ensuring sustainable water management and equitable resource distribution among Member States;

Added81. Stresses the important role of the European Investment Bank (EIB) in water financing; highlights the fact that the EIB is actively investing in and supporting the water sector; stresses that the EU should collaborate with the EIB to share best practice and calls, further, on the EIB and other financial institutions to strengthen their role in the funding of innovative and resilient water infrastructure, improved sanitation and drinking water infrastructure, digitalisation, as well as to support projects aimed at flood risk reduction, erosion prevention and the revitalization of watercourses, by facilitating favourable conditions for water investment;

Removed29. Calls for enhanced international cooperation, including at the level of river basins, to address the growing water crisis, ensure clean and high-quality water, promote sustainable water management and implement nature-based solutions;

Added82. Urges the Commission to explore and promote innovative financing mechanisms, including payments for ecosystem services and green bonds, while ensuring regulatory clarity and safeguards to prevent market distortions; calls on the EIB and other financial institutions to prioritise low-interest loans and credits for Member States and regional and local authorities undertaking large-scale restoration projects, with specific provisions to support economically disadvantaged regions;

Removed30. Urges the EU to lead international efforts to protect and restore water ecosystems, in line with the WFD, the EU Biodiversity Strategy and the European Green Deal;

Added83. Highlights the importance of public-private partnerships as a source of funding for water investment; calls on the Commission to incentivise private investment in the water sector by creating a supportive regulatory framework that may include co-financing opportunities and public-private partnerships in order to drive innovation, improve infrastructure and ensure sustainable water management solutions across the Member States; underlines, nevertheless, that the involvement of private investment in the EU water sector must not undermine the status of water as a public good and a public service, and that the long-term resilience of the sector, as well as the principles of accessibility, affordability and sustainability must be ensured;

Added84. Calls on the Member States to adopt governance frameworks that clearly define the roles and responsibilities of stakeholders in planning, financing and implementing nature-based solutions; believes that these frameworks should integrate funding from diverse sources, including philanthropic contributions and private-sector partnerships, while ensuring equitable access to resources for small-scale projects, particularly managed at local or regional levels;

Added85. Urges the Commission and the Member States to address water aspects in their budgets and to improve governance within the regions in the use of EU funds;

Added86. Underlines the need to provide targeted financial and technical assistance to municipalities to facilitate compliance with water-related legislation;

Added87. Encourages the Member States to accelerate the granting of authorisations for sustainable and innovative resilient water infrastructure projects to enable their rapid implementation in the face of the urgent challenges;

Added88. Notes that the application of the cost recovery principle on water services, which provides that all water users effectively and proportionately participate financially in the recovery of the costs of water services, remains low to non-existent in several Member States; calls on the Member States and their regional authorities to implement adequate water pricing policies and apply the cost recovery principle for both environmental and resource costs in line with the WFD; calls on the Member States to take into account the long investment cycles when implementing the cost recovery principle and to ensure sufficient funding is available for needed (re)investment;

Added89. Stresses the importance of ensuring that water pricing supports long-term water security by reflecting the economic, environmental and resource costs of water use; encourages the Member States and competent regional and local authorities to ensure that water pricing is economically sustainable, socially fair and promotes efficient water use, and that it reflects the availability of water across different Member States and regions, particularly in water-stressed regions, while safeguarding affordability for households and small businesses; calls on the Member States and competent regional and local authorities to insure transparent water prices and to raise awareness of the value of water services;

Added90. Points out that competent national water authorities will play a central role in implementing new water management and conservation plans at the level of the Member States; calls, therefore, on the Members States to financially and technically increase the capacity of those competent authorities to play a more significant enabling and advisory role in sustainable and future-proof water management and storage infrastructure; believes that EU funds, such as the Just Transition Fund, should be used to further assist Member States and water agencies in implementation;

AddedDigitalisation, security and technological innovation

Added91. Stresses the potential and the necessity for digitalisation and AI in improving the management and monitoring of bodies of water and water infrastructure, as well as in reporting and ensuring the comparability of data reflecting different geographical flow conditions;

Added92. Calls on the Commission, the Member States and water providers to mainstream transparency and digitalisation as fundamental principles in water management and to enhance the use of management and metering data, with the aim of strengthening monitoring, assessment, accountability and decision-making, while optimising and simplifying reporting obligations; calls for digitally enabled water technologies to facilitate real-time, sample-based and distance monitoring and reporting on water quality, leakages, usage and resources; calls for improved efficiency in the use of public funds and public spending in this area; recognises that widespread deployment of innovative digital technologies needs to be accompanied by digital skills training;

Added93. Emphasises the need to promote digitalisation and data-centric solutions in building a water-smart society; stresses the need to develop digital solutions for monitoring water consumption and optimising the use of water resources across all sectors; calls on the Commission, in cooperation with the Member States, to provide financial support for the implementation of smart water management systems, focusing on the needs of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs);

Added94. Points out that water systems, including water treatment and distribution systems, are considered one of the nation’s critical infrastructures and security pillars, and hence key for the EU’s strategic autonomy, and require increased protection and the ability of utilities to detect, respond to, and recover from physical and cyberthreats and cyberattacks; notes that a higher level of digitalisation comes with new vulnerabilities; points out that, in the event of a threat or an attack, water system operators can lose their ability to control the flow and quality of the water or lose the ability to track the true status of the water system; insists that vulnerability assessments and an emergency response plan should be an integral part of the water management system in every Member State; encourages the promotion of information sharing about threats to cybersecurity and procedures to exchange best practice among operators, as well as to establish a cybersecurity culture through technical security measures, competence building and awareness creation and communication; draws attention to the measures and provisions in the NIS2 Directive and the Critical Entities Resilience Directive which could help mitigate the arising security risks; calls on the Commission to take the lead in reinforcing the EU-level coordination formats and to propose effective tools in the upcoming Preparedness Union Strategy with the aim of ensuring timely preparedness to tackle environmental and non-environmental risks to the water bodies that are threatening the EU’s overall security;

Added95. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to increase the involvement of women in decisions regarding water resilience; calls for the adoption of a methodological approach that effectively considers gender-related needs in the implementation of water supply projects, by implementing monitoring, reporting and tracking that use tools and indicators disaggregated by gender;

Added96. Notes that better data and data analysis are key to evidence-based decision-making and the swift identification of small changes in water quality that could present a threat to bodies of water, together with the evaluation of best practice and identification of the most cost-effective and impactful measures;

Added97. Stresses that improved, reliable and interoperable data on water supply, demand, distribution, accessibility and use are needed and that data points need to be established; urges the Commission and the Member States to enhance data collection and improve data interoperability across all levels to support the implementation of current water legislation, as well as to facilitate circular economy and water-smart industrial symbiosis strategies; highlights the fact that data and AI could be used in modelling water and energy consumption as well as reuse and recycling capacities;

Added98. Calls on the Commission to better recognise the fundamental role of the water sector in bolstering EU competiveness by fostering research and innovation and promoting entrepreneurship and talent; emphasises, in this regard, the importance of ramping up innovation in the water sector; points out that the European Innovation Centre for Industrial Transformation and Emissions, created as part of Directive 2010/75/EU, could play a role in this regard, as it evaluates the environmental performance of industrial technologies and gathers information on innovative industrial environmental techniques; points, further, to existing partnerships like the Water4All Partnership, a funding programme for scientific research;

Added99. Believes that there is a need to build and nurture multi-stakeholder platforms to promote innovation uptake at all levels, local and national; recommends that these platforms involve a wide range of participants – the public and private sectors, and civil society associations – to build a coalition of partners to bring about change; supports the promotion of knowledge sharing on how digital water technologies can support the implementation of existing EU water legislation, as well as capacity building at local, regional and national levels; calls on the Commission and the Members States to expand digital skills, and research and development (R&D) programmes targeting water, including through collaboration with universities, research centres and SMEs;

Added100. Acknowledges the critical role of data centres in the digital economy; notes with concern that the rapid expansion of the technology could lead to a substantial increase in AI’s demand for water resources associated with their operations, which could undermine the environmental benefits that AI promises to deliver, such as resource optimisation and carbon emission reductions, and stresses the need to integrate water efficiency measures in their design and operation; urges the Commission to address the use of water resources by information and communications technologies (ICT) and, in particular, by AI and data centres in its EWRS, in particular by encouraging data centres to reuse treated water and to promote the design of more efficient chips and components to reduce the need for cooling; recommends that the Member States prioritise water resilience strategies that address the specific challenges posed by data centres to ensure the sustainability of both the digital and the environmental agendas;

Added101. Recalls that seawater desalination is the process of removing salt from sea or brackish water to make it useable for a range of ‘fit for use’ purposes, including drinking, and that it is thus an important technological solution for people’s livelihoods; notes that, at the same time, desalination is an energy-intensive process and should ideally be done using renewable energy, whenever possible, in order to minimise environmental impacts; reiterates that desalination produces a by-product, brine (a concentrated salt solution), that must be properly disposed of to avoid adverse impacts on the marine environment; considers, therefore, that desalination based on reverse osmosis or thermal technologies should be applied, if other more environmentally sustainable options are not available or cannot be implemented, particularly in remote areas and islands; highlights, in this regard, the ongoing work on new technological solutions, such as microbial desalination cells, offering an environmentally sustainable and innovative alternative to traditional desalination methods, particularly to provide clean water and wastewater treatment to small, isolated locations without electricity;

Added102. Stresses the need for increased funding and R&D into technologies such as innovative desalination techniques in order to increase the efficiency, sustainability and the scaling up of such technologies; calls for research into the possibilities of using such technologies in agriculture to diversify the water supply points and therefore decrease the vulnerability of the sector to water stress;

Added103. Notes that in the last decade, there have been many scientific breakthroughs for making water treatment smarter and more circular, with these solutions offering opportunities for using digital solutions, AI and remote sensing to use water more efficiently and by reusing treated wastewater for irrigation and recovering energy and nutrients from wastewater;

Added104. Calls on the Commission and the Member States to address the regulatory obstacles within the single market to facilitate the development, scaling-up, and placing on the market of innovative biotechnology and biomanufacturing solutions and the promotion of cleaner manufacturing and circularity;

Added105. Calls for the funding, development and authorisation of innovative solutions for crop protection and fertilisation, including biological control agents and active substances with lower impact on the environment, which are needed for a just transition to more sustainable agricultural systems;

Added106. Calls for specific programmes to be established for the cleaning and conservation of river channels, ensuring adequate flow and reducing the accumulation of debris and sediment that can affect water storage and distribution capacity;

AddedCross-border and international cooperation

Added107. Stresses the need for a comprehensive EWRS that fosters cross-border cooperation, more uniform data collection and reporting, sharing best practice between local, regional and national actors, ensuring sustainable water management and equitable resource distribution among the Member States, preventing water challenges such as scarcity and flood risk from being passed on to other Member States;

Added108. Emphasises that climate change represents a major threat to water resources and aquatic ecosystems; notes that floods and water scarcity compromise food and water security and the health of the general population, ultimately affecting social cohesion and stability; recognises that water resilience is crucial for preventing and addressing current and future health, food, energy and security crises; emphasises that water resilience promotes transboundary water cooperation, serving as a catalyst for peace and security, as countries are interconnected through shared rivers and groundwater resources;

Added109. Calls for increased cross-border cooperation between the Member States in the management of shared river basins and groundwater aquifers and in the effective collection and sharing of data on water quality, pollution levels and water levels; recommends the establishment of regional cooperation centres to coordinate the implementation of joint water resilience strategies, taking into account the climate, social and economic challenges of each territory;

Added110. Calls for enhanced international cooperation, including at the level of river basins, to address the growing water crisis, ensure clean and high-quality water, promote sustainable water management and implement various innovative water technologies, including nature-based solutions; calls for the anchoring of cooperation across borders at operational, tactical and strategic levels;

Added111. Calls for the establishment of cross-border projects under Interreg and other EU funds to improve regional cooperation in the management of water resources, with a particular focus on ensuring the fair distribution of water between sectors and Member States;

Added112. Stresses the need to strengthen EU monitoring capacities through digitalisation and modern technologies, including satellite surveillance and real-time pollution tracking, which are essential for preventing and combating cross-border pollution;