European Commission: Bathing Water Directive needs modernising

The Bathing Water Directive, which entered into force in 2006, needs modernising and improvement. That is the conclusion of an evaluation report presented by the European Commission on the 6^th of March 2025. One of the recommendations is to add other pollutants to the monitoring system. Also, monitoring should take place all year round and be modernized.  

The conclusions of the evaluation report on the Bathing Water Directive will be discussed in the context of the ongoing work on the Water Resilience Strategy and the European Ocean Pact. For now, the requirement for at least ‘sufficient’ water quality for all sites by 2015 has not been fully met by all Member States. Some Member States continue to struggle with identifying and monitoring bathing sites, leading to gaps in data and potential public health risks. In the past, the European Commission started several infringement procedures against Member States for not complying with the Bathing Water Directive, like, for example, recently Poland.

Recommendations World Health Organisation

The World Health Organisation (WHO) recommended that monitoring frequencies should be better adapted to local realities and cyanobacteria should be reflected in a classification system. In line with the WHO Guidelines, other pollutants/parameters, besides the two bacteriological parameters (E. coli and intestinal enterococci) currently covered by the Bathing Water Directive, should be considered based on human health risks. Unfortunately, in many countries raw sewage is still released into the sea, like on the Canary Islands, due to failures in urban wastewater treatment.

Better identification of all bathing sites

According to the evaluation report, the number of officially identified bathing sites is not accurate. The notion of a ‘large number of bathers’ required for the identification of a bathing site is not sufficiently well defined, and the participation of the public in the identification of the sites could be improved. Satellite images can also support more systematic identification of bathing sites. At the same time, changes in bathing habits (increase in year-round bathing) should be taken into consideration. This could mean that monitoring and reporting should occur not only during the current bathing season but all year round where necessary.

Real-time monitoring and online reporting

“The use of automated monitoring, satellite imaging, predictive modelling, and microbial source tracking can help automated and more frequent reporting. Combined with the use of online methods for providing information to the public. New technical methods, including predictive modelling, microbial source tracking and remote sensing, offer opportunities to supplement current sampling methods”, is suggested by the writers of the report. In the past pollution experts criticised the water sampling criteria firmly.

Economic benefits

The evaluation report states that the benefits of complying with the Bathing Water Directive outweigh its costs. The annual cost of implementing the bathing water rules are estimated at €575 million, but the monetized benefits of clean bathing water are estimated at €1.65 billion annually. The benefits include improved public health and tourism-related advantages.

Objectives Bathing Water Directive

The main objective of the Bathing Water Directive is to safeguard the health and well-being of people bathing in EU waters and to protect the environment. By ensuring that bathing waters meet certain quality standards, the Directive aims to contribute to the overall goal of promoting a clean and healthy environment for all. The European Commission gathered online views from the public in order to revise of the EU rules on bathing water in 2021 until 20 January 2022. The European Commission started reviewing the Bathing Water Directive at the beginning of 2023 and has taken a next step after presenting the official evaluation of the current Bathing Water Directive.