The polluter-pays principle should remain at the core of the Union’s wastewater treatment legislation

Ahead of the EU Council Environment meeting today, SGI Europe joins a multi-stakeholder agreement representing drinking and wastewater service providers, local public utilities, local and regional governments, environmental civil society organisations and water-related innovation industries to support the financing mechanism proposed by the European Commission to ensure a fair and equitable distribution of the costs involved in removing micro-pollutants from wastewater in the proposed revision of the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive (UWWTD).

In this joint statement, SGI Europe, Aquapublica, Eureau and six other stakeholders strongly welcome this proposal to make producers contribute to the cost of removing substances harmful for the environment from wastewater and stress the crucial need to maintain the EPR scheme in the final text negotiated between the European Parliament and the Council.

"The EPR scheme is an environmentally effective, economically efficient, and socially fair financing instrument to address the treatment of micro-pollutants in wastewater and avoid their discharge into receiving water bodies for the benefit of our health and the one of our ecosystems," the joint statement says.

As the Commission's proposal is being discussed today by Ministers in the Environment Council meeting, the undersigned organisations call on all policymakers at European and national level to safeguard this approach in the Commission’s proposal to ensure a fair transition towards a more sustainable, toxic-free Europe.