Click here to read the EU Environmental Implementation Review Country Report on the United Kingdom in full

Click here to read the EU Environmental Implementation Review Country Report on 28 Member States in full

The report on the UK is one of 28 country reports on Member States published as part of the European Commission’s Environmental Implementation Review (EIR), a new tool intended to improve implementation of European environmental policy and commonly agreed rules.

The Commission says in water quality and management, most Member States are struggling to reach full compliance on collection and treatment of urban wastewater, and 13 face EU legal action. Nitrates concentrations and eutrophication levels remain a serious issue in nearly all Member States.

For the UK, four main issues:

  • tackling water quality, notably agricultural pollution (nitrates)
  • but also remaining urban waste water issues such as storm water overflows,
  • together with improving air quality in urban areas and
  • completing the Natura 2000 designation process for marine sites

The main pressure on UK surface waters is diffuse pollution which affects 68% of water bodies. Flow regulation and morphological alterations affect 45% followed by point sources of pollution that affect 44% of water bodies. River management affects negatively 30% of water bodies and abstraction 14% of water bodies.

Key issues flagged up on the state of the UK’s water environment include: 

River Basin Management Plans – the RBMPs have some deficiencies that result in uncertainties about the status and effectiveness of Programmes of Measures. In particular there are weaknesses in ecological status assessment and the lack of effective measures to address diffuse pollution from agriculture where a high number of exemptions were applied.

The report says UK indicated phosphorus loading from agriculture needs to reduce by 28-43% to meet revised phosphate standards in the second cycle of river basin management plans. Agriculture is responsible for 50-60% of the nitrogen in surface waters.

In its first generation of RBMPs the United Kingdom reported the status of 9080 rivers, 1119 lakes, 192 transitional, 570 coastal and 656 groundwater bodies.

Only 41% of natural surface water bodies achieve a good or high ecological status and 27% of heavily modified or artificial water bodies achieve a good or high ecological potential. Only 41% of surface water bodies (while the status of 58% is unknown), 23% of heavily modified and artificial water bodies (73% unknown) and 74% of groundwater bodies achieve good chemical status. 

Bathing water quality – out of 633 bathing waters, 59.6 % were of excellent quality, 27.5 % of good quality and 7.6 % of sufficient quality. 31 bathing waters were of poor quality or noncompliant while it was not possible to assess the remaining 3 bathing waters. The report says this represents a significant decrease of bathing waters with excellent quality compared to 2014, which may be partly due to the fact that the UK only started to use the new bathing water standards for the 2015 bathing water season. 

Urban Waste Water Treatment Directive – with regard to the implementation of the UWWTD, the report says the latest reported data indicate high compliance rates, even though some non-compliances still exist. The UK is still in the process of implementing a Court ruling concerning London via construction of the £4.2bn Thames Tideway Tunnel. The UK has also been struggling with storm water overflows issues, which are progressively being addressed by innovative solutions (e.g. sustainable urban drainage systems), the report says.

The estimated investment needs reported by the UK to reach full compliance with the Directive are EUR €882 million. 

Flood risk areas – these have been identified and mapped in England. The report says that over the last decade England has regularly experienced flooding incidents with significant economic damage costs. Approximately 1 in 6 properties in England are at risk of flooding from rivers or the sea.

Between 2002 and 2013, for the 22 floods in England, 10 floods in Northern Ireland, 6 floods in Scotland and 10 floods in Wales the report says the total direct costs amounted to EUR €23,000 million.

The report states: “The management and prevention of floods is an area where the potentially more economical nature based solutions could improve resource efficiency through reducing costs and delivering multiple benefits.” 

Marine waters monitoring – the UK established a monitoring programme of its marine waters in 2014. However “it seems that its monitoring programmes for biodiversity, non-indigenous species, hydrographical changes and marine litter need further refinement to constitute an appropriate framework”, the report states . In addition, although the UK monitoring programme should have been operational as of 2014, a few descriptors will not be fully operational before 2018 (for marine litter and water column monitoring) or sometimes even 2020 (for seabed habitats, fish and underwater noise monitoring). 

“Considerable potential for additional revenue from environmental taxes in UK”

The Commission has also drawn attention  to a 2016 Eurostat study suggesting that there is “considerable potential for additional revenue from environmental taxes.” Under a good practice scenario these could generate an additional £6.44 billion (€ 8.08 billion) in 2018, rising to £14.37 billion (€ 18.02 billion) in 2030 (both in real 2015 terms). This is equivalent to an increase by 0.32% and 0.54% of GDP in 2018 and 2030, respectively.

The report says the second largest contribution to revenue after fuel taxes would come from the proposed water abstraction tax which accounts for £ 1.17 billion (€1.46 billion) in 2030 (real 2015 terms), equivalent to 0.04% of GDP.

According to the Commission, full implementation of EU environment legislation could save the EU economy €50 billion every year in health costs and direct costs to the environment.

Karmenu Vella, Commissioner for Environment, Fisheries and Maritime Affairs, said:

“Patchy and uneven implementation of environmental rules helps no one. Improving how environmental laws are applied benefits citizens, public administrations and the economy.  This is where the Environmental Implementation Review (EIR) comes in. The European Commission is committed to helping Member States make sure that the quality of their citizens’ air, water and waste management is of the highest standard. This Review provides the information, the tools and the timetable to do this”. 

Continued EU biodiversity loss could compromise ecosystem services

The Review also says that despite many local success stories in nature and biodiversity, the implementation of EU nature legislation needs to be stepped up. Otherwise biodiversity loss will continue in the EU, compromising the capacity of ecosystems to provide for human needs in the future.

Continuous degradation of biodiversity is an ongoing trend in UK as in large parts of the EU, according to the UK report. Agriculture, pollution and hydrological modifications in the UK are amongst the highest ranking threats to biodiversity:

“The key pressure on nature appears to come from agriculture, possibly due to too much reliance being placed on voluntary compliance.” 

UK “quite advanced” on Natural Capital Accounting”

However, the report describes the UK as “quite advanced” on natural capital accounting, referring to the  national Natural Capital Accounting 2020 Roadmap and an interim review which has already been carried out. The Office of National Statistics (ONS) has also published natural capital accounts, including on land cover, woodlands and fresh water.

The new EIR package includes: 28 country reports which map national strengths, opportunities and weaknesses; a Communication summarising the political conclusions of the country reports and examining common trends, in areas such as air quality, waste management and the circular economy, water quality and protecting nature and biodiversity; and recommendations for improvements to all Member States.

The launch of the EIR package will be followed by discussions with each Member State, the launch of a peer-to-peer tool to allow Member States to help each other with expertise, and political debates in the Environment Council.

Click here to read the EU Environmental Implementation Review Country Report on the United Kingdom in full

Click here to read the EU Environmental Implementation Review Country Report on 28 Member States in full

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