DIRECTORATE-GENERAL
ENVIRONMENT
Directorate C - Sustainable Resources Management, Industry & Air
ENV.C.1 - Sustainable Production and Consumption
EMAS Awards Questionnaire – 2012
Water Management (incl. Water efficiency & Water quality)
Version: 30-6-2012
Introduction
The European EMAS Award is the most prestigious award in environmental management and has been presented every year to EMAS registered organisations since 2005. The EMAS Awards are established by the European Commission and reward the best performance related to a specific EMAS related environmental theme. EMAS registered organizations, in the following six categories; micro-organisations, small organisations, medium organisations, large organisations, small public administration and large public administration, are selected at national level according to the specific theme for each year. The candidates are evaluated by a special EMAS Awards Jury. All registered organizations from industrial, service or public sectors can be awarded. This year the Forum of Competent Bodies and the European Commission have decided to acknowledge the achievements of those EMAS organisations which have excelled in issues related to: “Water management (including water efficiency & water quality)”.
Water is the key to life: a crucial resource that everyone needs – and not just for drinking. A good management and use of this precious resource helps us tackle the water challenge now and in the future. Measures can be sub-divided into the following two categories: a) water quality, b) water quantity.Both categories are related to the direct and indirect environmental aspects of an EMAS registered organisation.
The jury will assess and compare the different water management measures of organisations and their effects. The degree in which an organisation can exert influence differs between the direct environmental aspects and indirect environmental aspects (see also Annex I of the EMAS Regulation). The environmental aspects related to water concern direct and indirect releases (emissions) of (waste)water to water and the effects of those discharges. The indirect aspects relate more to water issues in the supply chain. The core indicator for water quantity is the total annual water consumption[1] expressed in cubic meters (m3), and for water quality they are total loads of pollutants that are released into the environment.
The type of water management measures an organisation implements differ depending on the degree of influence the organisation can exert over it.
Therefore we will distinguish between the following categories:
- Water Management measures related to the direct environmental effects
This category can be sub-divided in measures that relate to water efficiency measures (measuring and reducing water consumption; measures 1, 2 and 3 in annex I), water quality measures (ensuring the best possible quality of water and a reduction of emissions of pollutants to water; measures 4 and 5 in annex I) and finally water quantity measures (rainwater harvesting etc.; measure 6 in annex I).
- Water Management measures related to the indirect environmental effects
This category can be sub-divided in measures that relate to water efficiency measures (measuring and reducing water consumption; measures 1, 2 and 3 from annex I), water quality measures (ensuring the best possible quality of water and a reduction of emissions of pollutants to water; measures 4 and 5 from annex I) and finally water quantity measures (rainwater harvesting etc.; measures 6 from annex I). Organisations that try to improve their indirect environmental effects mostly assess supply chain and customer effects and try to improve them. Water footprints and mitigation of water related effects (described under measures 7 and 8 in Annex I) are often used for this purpose.
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ANNEX I Background information on water management measures related to environmental performance
An absolute prerequisite for benchmarking environmental excellence is collecting information and measuring environmental performance. Information baselines must be established to identify, track, and measure inputs (i.e. energy, water, materials) and outputs in forms of products, wastes and emissions. Best practice for an EMAS registered company/organisation in general is having established a management system taking all relevant aspects into account (conservation and protection of drinking water resources, minimisation of water consumption, rain water harvesting, segregation of surface run-off water and waste water, treatment of run-off water prior to local retention/infiltration, advanced treatment of waste water including tertiary treatment and re-use in water-stress regions as well as optimisation of energy efficiency) and practising stakeholder involvement.
1)Identification of the water consumption of the organisation and an assessment of the associated impacts.
Assessing the water consumption of an organisation first means identifying where the total volume of water that the organisation needs comes from. Therefore the first step is 'identification'.
a)Identifying the total volume of water the organisation withdraws from any water source
This means water that is either directly withdrawn by the EMAS registered organization or through water suppliers and also includes the abstraction of cooling water. Assessing the total volume of water withdrawn by source improves the understanding of the overall scale of potential impacts and risks resulting from the water use of the EMAS registered organisation. The total volume withdrawn indicates the organisation’s relative size and importance as a user of water, and provides a baseline figure for other calculations relating to efficiency and use. The systematic effort to monitor and improve the efficient use of water also directly correlates to water consumption costs. This helps identifying the costs savings of water efficiency measures. Total water use is also an indicator of the level of risk that disruptions in the water supplies can cause to an organisation or what impact an increase of the cost of water has on an organisation. Because freshwater of sufficient quality is increasingly becoming scarce, production processes that need large volumes of water are susceptible to disruptions in this respect. The total volume of water withdrawn is usually measures in cubic meters per year (m3/year). The following sources are usually distinguished: surface water (incl. water from rivers, lakes, oceans and wetlands), ground water, rainwater (usually collected directly and stored by the EMAS registered organisation itself), waste water (for example used as grey water from another nearby organization) and finally water supplied by water utilities (sometimes also called municipal water). The total water withdrawal is defined as the sum of all water drawn into the boundaries of the EMAS organisation from all sources (including surface water, ground water, rainwater, and municipal water supply) for any use over the course of a year. The actual water consumption can be deducted from the water withdrawal by subtracting the volume that is reintroduced in an unaltered/non-polluted status. This means that an organisation can extract a lot of water, but as long as the majority of that water is reinserted in an unaltered status, the actual consumption is much lower and the associated effects of the remaining consumption can be much lower.Therefore, in order to assess the impacts of the water use the organisation needs to assess the effects of her water 'withdrawals'. That assessment is part of point b). In order to be able to distinguish a trend in the organisations performance on water management a trend of the water consumption of at least the last 3 years, but preferably the last 5 years, needs to be provided.
b)Water sources whose quantity is significantly affected by withdrawal of water.
Since water is a local issue that is very important it can actually not be addressed on the volumetric level of m³, without looking at contextual information. In other words: consuming a certain amount of water in a scarce region or from a limited water body is worse than performing the same activity in a region where water is abundant. Although the EU Water Framework Directive obliges the national competent bodies for water to have this kind of information available as a basis for drafting their local water management plans, it can sometimes be difficult for EMAS registered organisations to collect information like this, especially since the large part of them withdraws water from municipal service. Government authorities sometimes do not provide information on this easily. So it can be already quite an achievement of an EMAS registered organisation if they managed to collect information on how much influence their water consumption (that is mostly provided to them by the municipal water provider) has on such sources.
Assessing if withdrawals come from a water source that is significantly affected by the abstraction, e.g. by lowering the water table, reducing the volume of water available within an ecosystem, or otherwise altering the ability of an ecosystem to perform its functions can already be an achievement as such. However, (indirect) water abstractions may have a much wider impact on the quality of life in the area, including economic and social consequences. Therefore this indicator can provide the EMAS registered organisation with a more quantified assessment of the scale of the impacts associated with their water use. This Indicator also enables an assessment of specific areas of risk for example when other water users also extract water from the same water source as well as room or improvement. Finally the indicator also provides insights in the stability of the organization’s own water sources. To identify if a water source is significantly affected by the organisations water withdrawal the withdrawals need to meet one or more of the following criteria:
- For the quantitative status, a rule of thumb could be that withdrawals that exceed 5 % or more of the annual average volume of a given water body can potentially have a significant impact on this water body. However, it needs to be noted that in some cases competitive water uses can lead to scarcity too, so EMAS registered organisation need to be aware of that. On the other hand any withdrawal from a particularly sensitive, even if less than 5% can have negative effects on such water bodies as well;
- Because withdrawals from particularly sensitive water bodies are not desirable, an EMAS registered organisation should have a good overview of the relative size, function, or status of nearby water bodies and/or a rare, threatened, or endangered (eco)systems in order to avoid potential negative impacts of any kind of abstractions on these water bodies.
According to the Water Framework Directive, governmental bodies have the obligation to classify all surface water bodies according to the chances of achieving or not achieving a good ecological or chemical status and for groundwater quantitative status or chemical status by 2015. This status is included in the River basin Management plans adopted in 2009 by the government bodies. Consequently any abstraction of water requires a prior authorisation by governmental bodies. Authorisations should take into account the status and eventual risks of failing to achieve good status. Consequently, the licences (and their conditions) issued to EMAS registered organisations should be in line with that as well. EMAS registered organisations can obtain all information on the characteristics of a water source or protected area from the river basin management plans and the local or national water-related ministries or government departments who are Competent Authorities for the Water Framework Directive, or research such as environmental impact assessments.
2)Percentage and total volume of water recycled and reused
The rate of water reuse and recycling within an EMAS organisation can be a measure of efficiency and can demonstrate the success of the organization in reducing total water withdrawals and discharges. Increased reuse and recycling can result in a reduction of water consumption, treatment, and emission costs. The reduction of water consumption through reuse and recycling can also contribute to local, national, or regional goals for managing water supplies. This indicator measures both water that was treated prior to reuse and water that was not treated prior to reuse. Grey water (i.e., collected rainwater and waste water generated by household processes such as washing dishes, laundry, and bathing) is included. This indicator can be assessed by calculating the volume of recycled/reused water based on the volume of water demand satisfied by recycled/reused water. This means that a water demand has been satisfied by re-use rather than by new withdrawals. An example could be the following: if the organization has a production cycle that requires 50 cubic meters of water per (production) cycle, the organization would need to withdraw 50 cubic meters of water for one production process cycle. If the organisation would then reuse this water it for an additional two cycles. The total volume of water recycled/ reused for that process is 100m3 (cubic meters). The organisation saved 100 m3 of (virgin) water that need not to be withdrawn. The organisation should report the total volume of water recycled/reused in m3 over the course of a reporting year (m3/year). In addition this indicator can also be expressed as a percentage of the total water withdrawal reported under the previous indicator. Recycling/reuse thus refers to the act of (re)processing used water/waste water through another cycle before discharge to final treatment and/or discharge to the environment. Normally the following three types of water recycling/re-use can be distinguished:
- Waste water recycled back in the same process or higher use in the process cycle;
- Waste water recycled/re-used in a different process, but within the same EMAS registered organisation; and
- Waste water re-used at another than the EMAS registered organisation’s e.g. in an adjacent organisation (so called water cascading).
Possible (sector specific) indicators to assess the environmental performance of an EMAS registered organisation would be.
- Water consumption per unit product or per employee (l/product or l/person/day). EMAS organisations are invited to provide monitoring data to demonstrate that their water consumption is lower than the sector average in which they are operating.
- Percentage of re-used waste water (e.g. for irrigation) in water-stress regions
In order to minimise the amount of water that is wasted through leakage, public EMAS registered organisations like e.g. municipalities (this is less applicable to private organisations), should preferably manage their leakages. In other words they should implement a system to systematically control and to minimise leakages in the water supply system as well as in the sewer system. Possible indicators that can be used to monitor what kind of activities EMAS registered organisations deploy in this field are:
- Percentage of losses of drinking water in the distribution network (%)
- Percentage of annually controlled distribution network (especially relevant water supply and waste water collection)
- Percentage of the sewer network which needs repair or exchange due to leakages
- Finally, for municipalities it is also important to encourage to citizens to save water and or to harvest rain water. This can be done through pricing policies for drinking water and waste water,but also by communicating to citizens how they can save water or harvest rain water.
3)Water Quality: assessing all water discharges (including runoff) by quality and destination.
The amount and quality of the water discharged by an EMAS registered organisation is directly linked to ecological impact and operational costs. By improving the quality of discharged water while at the same time reducing the discharged volumes, an EMAS registered organisation can reduce its impact on the surrounding environment. Measures/actions to improve the quality of the water also include the protection of groundwater resources with respect to pollution (nitrate, pesticides) and exploitation. When monitoring water quality, it is of utmost importance that the (total) pollutant loads are taken into account. This means the lowering concentrations of pollutants is one thing, but discharging large water volumes with low concentrations of pollutants still adds up to high total pollutant loads. Therefore dilution can be important to lower the direct damages of too high concentrations, but dilution is not a final solution since total pollution loads remain very relevant.
In relation to this the European Water Framework Directive (WFD) is the most important piece of legislation. It sets EU wide quality standards for a set of priority substance pollutants (chemical status), and some are also required to be phased out completely. Each Member State needs to identify the nationally relevant pollutants and set quality standards for those (as part of ecological status). In order to reach those quality standards measures need to be taken to reduce pollution from both point (large or small) and diffuse sources. Such measures can range from use restrictions to end-of)-pipe solutions of wastewater treatment prior to discharge. This means that usually, considerations like this should be reflected in the permits and licences issued to the EMAS registered organisation. However, even if the discharges do not violate legal requirements they may have a significant impact on the receiving water body. Therefore an EMAS registered organisation should carefully monitor any discharge of effluents or process water to the environment whenever possible. As part of the environmental review EMAS registered organisations identify legal requirements and determine all water discharges (excluding collected rainwater and domestic sewage from toilets) by destination and have identified how the discharged waste water is treated and they shall ensure that these discharges have no significant impact on the receiving water body or the waste water treatment plant. Significant in this respect means in relation to the impact of any pollutant or quality elements that may hinder the receiving water body form reaching a good ecological status.
Normally EMAS registered organization measure and monitor their water discharges. However if this is not the case this figure can mostly be estimated by subtracting the approximate volume consumed on-site from the volume withdrawn. The total volume of water discharges is normally reported in cubic meters per reporting year (usually a calendar year). If the EMAS organisation discharges effluents or process water they normally report the following standard parameters such as Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD), Total Suspended Solids (TSS), etc. to indicate the quality of the discharged water. The specific choice of quality parameters will vary depending on the organization’s products/ services/operations, and all pollutants discharged shall be reported. The selection of parameters should be consistent with those used in the organization’s sector. The total volume of water discharged by an organisation is the sum of water effluents (notably total pollution loads for all relevant pollutants) discharged within a year to surface waters, sewers, treatment facilities, and/or ground water through a point source discharge or a non-point source discharge, or waste water that is otherwise removed from the organization e.g. via truck etc.. The EMAS registered organisation must absolutely monitor the total pollution loads for all relevant pollutants in all discharges over a year.