Water Framework Directive
Regime of the objectives
The WFD rules out any breach with respect to its objectives in certain circumstances, where all practical steps are taken to prevent such adverse impacts and the programmes of measures and management plans are adapted accordingly: temporary deterioration in the status of bodies of water resulting from natural causes or force majeure or accidental ones, alterations to the level of bodies of groundwater or new activities of “sustainable human development”, etc. (Article 4(5) to (7)). The Directive not only includes general obligations but also applies to specific projects (Case C 461/13 Bund für Umwelt und Naturschutz Deutschland, para. 47) and the duty to prevent the deterioration of surface water bodies is “applicable to every surface water body type and status for which a management plan has or should have been adopted.” A Member State is thus “required to refuse authorisation for a project where it is such as to result in deterioration of the status of the body of water concerned or to jeopardise the attainment of good surface water status, unless the view is taken that the project is covered by a derogation” (Case C 461/13, para. 50).
Measures for the protection, enhancement and restoration of water bodies were to be taken with a view of achieving a status of water bodies characterised as “good”, in principle by 2015. Such deadline could be extended if it could not reasonably be complied with for technical, natural or cost reasons and provided, inter alia, that no further deterioration occurs, within the limit of two updates of the river basin district management plan, except in the case of natural conditions requiring it (Article 4(4)).
The specific quality objectives allowing water bodies to be so characterised reflect both pollution prevention and the quest for a “good” water status with certain nuances for surface waters and for the groundwater.