The European Water Framework Directive requires all water bodies to achieve good status by 2015. Several derogations are proposed to postpone the deadline for achieving good status (to 2021 or 2027) or to define a less strict objective. All of these derogations must be the subject of a detailed argument to the EU. There are three possible reasons for derogating from the initial objective: natural conditions or technical feasibility (technical reasons) and disproportionate costs (economic reasons). The study carried out focuses on the latter reason, for which some twenty bodies of water have been identified as potentially suffering from disproportionate costs.
Ecology
Industrial pollution
Objective of the cost-effectiveness analysis :
• Arguing that the cost of achieving good status on a water resource is disproportionate, because the costs outweigh the benefits or because users are unable to afford the measures.
Project stages :
• Simplified analysis of 21 water bodies and detailed analysis of 5 water bodies
• CBA, ability-to-pay analysis, economic valuation of market and non-market benefits (through value transfer)
