Activities of Sandra PEREIRA related to 2022/0344(COD)
Shadow opinions (1)
OPINION on the proposal for a directive of the European Parliament and of the Council amending Directive 2000/60/EC establishing a framework for Community action in the field of water policy, Directive 2006/118/EC on the protection of groundwater against pollution and deterioration and Directive 2008/105/EC on environmental quality standards in the field of water policy
Amendments (19)
Amendment 28 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 1 a (new)
Recital 1 a (new)
(1a) Water is a public good of all and for all which, as a natural resource that is essential, irreplaceable and indispensable to life, must be considered and integrated in its three dimensions: social, economic and environmental.
Amendment 31 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 1 b (new)
Recital 1 b (new)
(1b) The commodification of water, for example its negotiation as a resource in contracts on the New York Stock Exchange that set a weekly reference number governing the price of the right to water, is yet another threat in a long series of attempts to commodify nature, thus making public and essential goods the object of speculation; this constitutes the denial of the exercise of the universal right to its enjoyment.
Amendment 33 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 1 c (new)
Recital 1 c (new)
(1c) The transfer of responsibility to private companies facilitated by EU legislation leads to an increase in direct supply costs, the imposition of higher tariffs and limitations on local supply solutions tailored to the community;
Amendment 36 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 1 d (new)
Recital 1 d (new)
(1d) The European Parliament resolutions of 5 October 2022 on access to water as a human right – the external dimension and of 8 September 2015 on the follow-up to the European Citizens’ Initiative ‘Right2Water’ state that water should be treated as a common good and that it should therefore be managed by public bodies to ensure that the preservation of ecosystems and universal access to clean water take precedence over economic considerations.
Amendment 40 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 3 a (new)
Recital 3 a (new)
(3a) The growing scarcity of water resources is a reality being experienced by ever more people in the Member States as a result of climate change caused by political and economic choices; there is an urgent need for a policy that prioritises water use in drought conditions that itself affords priority to the use of water for human consumption, public health, small and medium-sized agriculture adapted to the specific conditions of the Member States, small and medium-sized industry, and also the needs of ecosystems. People must have fair, universal access to clean water, such access is, therefore, not compatible with certain unsustainable industrial and agricultural practices, in particular intensive cultivation practices, among others.
Amendment 43 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 3 b (new)
Recital 3 b (new)
(3b) Stresses that the objectives of achieving ‘good status for water bodies’ and ensuring the availability of water cut across many sectors and that these objectives are often not pursued with sufficient coherence in other EU policies; stresses that sound water management must be mainstreamed into all EU policies on sectors that consume water, such as agriculture and energy. Underscores that common policies, sector-specific EU legislation and investments that have received financing should be assessed on a case-by-case basis to ascertain their potential impact on water resources and then amended accordingly.
Amendment 45 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 6 a (new)
Recital 6 a (new)
(6a) Since groundwater ecosystems are more vulnerable to stress than many other freshwater ecosystems and given the difficulty associated with decontaminating polluted groundwater and the importance of groundwater as a source of drinking water, a safety-first approach should be applied when establishing groundwater threshold values in order to protect groundwater ecosystems, human health and ecosystems dependent on groundwater. As a minimum, under such a safety-first policy, no groundwater threshold values should therefore exceed the corresponding surface water EQS.
Amendment 47 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 7 a (new)
Recital 7 a (new)
(7a) The proper transposition of this Directive is greatly dependent upon the preventive measures taken by the Member States. Member States are duty-bound not only to measure, to the best of their ability, the chemical status of ground and surface waters, but also to take all reasonable measures to prevent water pollution.
Amendment 49 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 9
Recital 9
(9) Directive 2000/60/EC requires Member States to identify water bodies used for the abstraction of water intended for human consumption, to monitor them, and to take the necessary measures to avoid deterioration in their quality and to reduce the level of purification treatment required in the production of water that is fit for human consumption. In this context, micro-plastics have been identified as a potential risk to human health, but more monitoring data are required to confirm the need for setting an environmental quality standard for micro-plastics in surface and groundwaters. Micro-plastics should therefore be included in the surface and groundwater watch lists and should be monitored as soon as the Commission has identified suitable monitoring methods. In this context , account should be taken of the methodologies for monitoring and assessing the risks from micro-plastics in drinking water, developed under Directive (EU) 2020/2184 of the European Parliament and of the Council57. Once pollution has occurred, the cost of removing the hazardous substances should fall chiefly on the polluter. __________________ 57 Directive (EU) 2020/2184 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 December 2020 on the quality of water intended for human consumption (recast) (OJ L 435, 23.12.2020, p. 1).
Amendment 55 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 10 a (new)
Recital 10 a (new)
(10a) The pollution of groundwater and surface water is not only detrimental to biodiversity and costly for water treatment systems, it also places a major burden on public health systems. Addressing this issue by setting lower maximum concentration values for substances and tackling pollution at its source would, at the same time, be an effective way of contributing towards the sound management of public finances.
Amendment 61 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 13 a (new)
Recital 13 a (new)
(13a) More than half of the EU’s water bodies in the European Union do not comply with threshold values for water quality, and data is scarce, which is a symptom of difficulties on the part of the Member States’ inspection and monitoring services in achieving the objectives set by the Directive. It is therefore necessary to provide the Member States’ inspection and monitoring services with sufficient financial and human resources to achieve the objectives laid down in the Directive.
Amendment 65 #
Proposal for a directive
Recital 17 a (new)
Recital 17 a (new)
(17a) Compliance with the EU’s carbon- neutrality targets should not come at the expense of unquantified ecological impacts on our ecosystems and biodiversity. The lists of priority environmental substances and the watch list should be regularly updated in line with scientific and technological findings on economic sectors that are expected to grow, thus posing a high risk of water pollution, with a view to effecting an energy transition.
Amendment 77 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point 2 – point c
Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point 2 – point c
Directive 2000/60/EC
Article 2 – point 30 a
Article 2 – point 30 a
(30a) ‘Priority hazardous substances’ means priority substances which are marked as ‘hazardous’ on the basis that they are recognised in scientific reports, in relevant Union legislation, or in relevant international agreements, as being toxic, persistent and liable to bio-accumulate, endocrine disruptors, or substances identified as persistent, mobile and toxic (PMT)/very persistent and very mobile (vPvM) or as giving rise to an equivalent level of concern, where this concern is relevant to the aquatic environment. and which requires action in accordance with [ref. measures to phase out PHS within 20 years of listing].
Amendment 92 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 2
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 2
2006/118/EC
Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point b a (new)
Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point b a (new)
(ba) criteria for the assessment of the good ecological status of groundwater;
Amendment 100 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 6
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 6
Directive 2006/118/EC
Article 6 a (new) – paragraph 1 – subparagraph 4
Article 6 a (new) – paragraph 1 – subparagraph 4
ECHA shall prepare scientific reports to assist the Commission in selecting the substances and indicators for the watch list, taking into account the following information:
Amendment 101 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 6
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 6
(e) information on production volumes, use patterns, intrinsic properties (including mobility in soils and, where relevant, particle size), concentrations in the environment and adverse effects to human health and the aquatic environment of a particular substance or group of substances, including information gathered in accordance with Regulation (EC) No 1907/2006 of the European Parliament and of the Council***, Regulation (EC) No 1107/2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council****, Regulation (EU) No 528/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council*****, Regulation (EU) 2019/6 of the European Parliament and of the Council******, Directive 2001/83/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council******* and Directive 2009/128/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council********;, including guidance collected at the time the request was made, such as the European Medicines Agency’s Guideline on assessing the environmental and human health risks of veterinary medicinal products in groundwater (EMA/CVMP/ERA/103555/2015, 30 April 2018).
Amendment 116 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 11 a
Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 11 a
Directive 2006/118/EC
Annex I – paragraph 1 a (new)
Annex I – paragraph 1 a (new)
Amendment 118 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 3 – paragraph 1 – point 3 – point a
Article 3 – paragraph 1 – point 3 – point a
Directive 2008/105/EC
Article 5 – paragraph 1 – subparagraph 2
Article 5 – paragraph 1 – subparagraph 2
Amendment 119 #
Proposal for a directive
Article 3 – paragraph 1 – point 3 – point c
Article 3 – paragraph 1 – point 3 – point c
Directive 2008/105/EC
Article 5 – paragraph 4 – subparagraph 3
Article 5 – paragraph 4 – subparagraph 3