|
Groundwater Protection in Selected Countries 1. SummaryThe purpose of this report is to describe and discuss policies and strategies for groundwater protection in five selected countries in relation to soil contamination and remediation of point sources. These five countries are Austria, Denmark, England, Spain and the USA. Today, most industrialised countries have developed laws on the protection of groundwater. These laws may be based on the precautionary principle and be very stringent, requiring that groundwater maintain all of its beneficial uses (multifunctionality). Implementation of these laws may in turn present great financial challenges. With respect to contaminated sites management, it is therefore valuable to examine these laws and to consider the role of the precautionary principle in groundwater protection. In 1995, the European Environment Agency prepared the first pan-European State of the Environment Report, the Dobris Assessment. This report identified and reviewed 12 environmental problems of particular European concern. Two of these concerns were Inland Waters (including groundwater) and Soil Degradation (including contaminated sites). The Dobris Assessment emphasises, therefore, the importance of this subject. In order to reach the goal of successfully protecting the groundwater resource from point source contamination, a number of milestones must be passed. Exactly which milestones are passed depends partly on the path taken but usually include prevention of future release of contaminants, identification of existing point sources which may contaminate the groundwater resource and remediation of these sites. Milestones can be viewed as falling into one or more of three categories: legislative, technological and implementary. This milestone approach can be helpful in several ways, such as determining the current status of a country’s protection efforts, or in discussing the merits of new groundwater protection strategies. The precautionary principle has been a part of the environmentalists language for only 2 decades. Groundwater protection legislation is generally based on this principle. In this report, the precautionary principle is defined, and it is noted that according to the precautionary principle, lack of full scientific certainty should not be used as a reason for postponing measures to prevent environmental degradation. In addition, the report describes various pitfalls in implementing the precautionary principle. In this report, various comparisons of the five countries with respect to contaminated sites, water supply and groundwater protection are made. In general, the report found that much data collected in the individual countries is heterogeneous in nature and therefore not suitable for comparison. Simple calculations are made for the five countries in the report to determine environmental pressures and groundwater resources. These calculations do not include regional variations within each country and are intended only to give a general backdrop. Through these calculations, it was found that Austria is in an apparent positive situation while England and Denmark face the greatest challenges of the five countries. Data collected on the number of contaminated sites in each country could not be compared due to a number of reasons. Most countries prioritise contaminated sites for remediation on the basis of a risk assessment. However, some countries start this process by an initial division of aquifers into two categories. Financing of remediation is approached in various ways; through the polluter pays principle, through general or specific taxes, or through landowner liability. Groundwater accounts for between 20% (Spain) and 100% (Denmark) of the water supply in the countries in this study. Austria obtains a significant portion of its water supply from spring water. Agriculture is a major water consumption category for Spain, USA and Denmark. This indicates that agricultural use is highly dependent on the intensity of agriculture as well as on precipitation. In the five countries studied, implementation of groundwater protection initiatives is carried out on various scales, ranging well field initiatives to recharge areas to initiatives on the scale of an entire country. Specific distances or groundwater travel times are used by all countries to determine zones around specific well fields. National overviews vary greatly, some based on aquifer vulnerability and some on aquifer value. Initiatives on the recharge area scale are perhaps the most challenging, due to data requirements and the size of the areas affected. No countries have yet completed zoning on the recharge area scale. The report concludes by describing three groundwater protection strategies: mulitfunctionality, water treatment and combined strategy. These strategies are discussed to illustrate the challenges which can be a consequence of selecting a groundwater protection strategy for a country. Finally, a number of open questions suitable for discussion are listed.
|