Turning Europe back on to tap water

EU measures to improve water quality have not stopped the public drinking bottled water, writes Eliza Gray.

European demand for bottled water is growing all the time. According to the Beverage Marketing Corporation, in 2004 Europe was the greatest consumer of bottled water worldwide. European consumption of bottled water increased by nearly 60% from 34,328 cubic metres in 1997 to 53,661 cu/m in 2004.

From a health perspective, there is no reason why people should drink bottled water instead of tap water. "There is no scientific evidence that bottled water is better than the tap water that meets the WHO guidelines," says Roger Aertgeerts, regional adviser on water and sanitation at the World Health Organisation.

Residents of the EU can rely on high quality tap water because of the drinking water directive of 1998. The directive dictates a standard of drinking water quality that is based on World Health Organization guidelines. A Commission official describes the directive as "a European success story".

The specific challenges that EU member states face when trying to comply with water quality standards vary, according to Aertgeerts.

"Water distribution systems can present challenges such as lead in pipes. Problems can also arise from chemicals like arsenic which occur naturally in the water. Still others come from contamination of water resources, such as the use of pesticides,"he says.

The water framework directive (WFD) of 2000 examined all these aspects of water quality in relation to each other. "The past directives," says a Commission official, "took a more 'patchwork' approach to improving water quality: they addressed the individual steps towards safe drinking water from the source to your glass." But water purification should be regarded as a continuous process, he says, adding that the WFD integrated existing regulations to provide "a more holistic approach" to water quality.

The directive aims to ensure cleaner water at the source. "From the perspective of protecting human health, controlling the pollution of water resources is very important because it limits the risk involved with producing water," says Aertgeerts.

As well as reducing risks for water producers, the standards set by the directive may also reduce production costs. "Currently EU water is not safe until it has been chemically treated, because water sources still have problems with pollution. The WFD will result in cleaner water at the source, which will allow private companies and governments to ensure quality without expensive chemical treatments that incur high maintenance costs."

Yet still, European consumers are turning to bottled water.

"The fact that bottled water sales have increased in Europe despite the availability of clean drinking water is not very well understood," says the Commission official. "I suspect it may be partially due to marketing and a lack of awareness that EU water is safe."

The EU citizens' ignorance may stem from a flaw in the reporting system for water quality put in place by the water framework directive. At present, member states report their water quality to the Commission three times a year, but the data is obsolete by the time it reaches the public.

"It takes as much as five years from the time the data is recorded to the time that the Commission publishes it," the Commission's water policy expert says. "The system needs upgrading, but the appropriate steps have been taken to correct it." In future, Water Information System for Europe will make the comprehensive reports to the Commission immediately available on the internet.

The availability of information has already begun to improve. In Brussels, for example, citizens can go to the regional water website www.ibde.be to compare the quality of the drinking water in their community to the standards of the framework directive. Some areas of the city have cleaner water than standards set by the WFD. The reservoir that serves the centre of Brussels, for example, has an aluminium value of less than ten, which is far less than the directive's maximum admissible value of 200.

Some countries put a report of the water quality on the back of the water bill.

The European Commission in its recent paper on water scarcity and drought stressed the value of water-metering as a measure to promote water efficiency. While metering has been a subject of controversy in the past, particularly in the UK, many EU member states have compulsory metering in private homes.

Green campaigners argue that water-metering is essential to improve water-efficiency because it is the only way to measure leakage.

Beate Werner of the European Environment Agency says: "Water-metering can help make the pipe and drainage systems more efficient. We are now facing a phase of ageing infrastructure and so we are re-doing pipes and we need water-metering in order to determine how much water we need in different areas. The pipes need to be sized correctly to meet different water needs because pipes that funnel too much water into various sources can lead to waste."

Water-metering also contributes to efficiency by helping national and local governments to price water correctly so as to manage demand. But the Commission's report warns against making water unaffordable for low-income families.

Werner says: "Water is both a commercial good that has a price and a common good that has a social aspect...both of these sides are right." The challenge, she says, is that "getting the price right does not necessarily mean getting the price high".

EU measures to improve water quality have not stopped the public drinking bottled water, writes Eliza Gray.