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Svenskt Vatten

Svenskt Vatten is the Swedish association for water and wastewater utilities.

Lobbying Activity

Meeting with Laia Pinos Mataro (Cabinet of Executive Vice-President Stéphane Séjourné) and BDEW Bundesverband der Energie- und Wasserwirtschaft e. V.

7 Oct 2025 · Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive, with particular focus on EPR

Meeting with Heléne Fritzon (Member of the European Parliament)

24 Sept 2025 · planering PFAS-seminarium

Meeting with Heléne Fritzon (Member of the European Parliament)

16 Sept 2025 · planering PFAS-seminarium

Meeting with Heléne Fritzon (Member of the European Parliament)

5 Sept 2025 · planering PFAS-seminarium

Meeting with Heléne Fritzon (Member of the European Parliament)

2 Jul 2025 · planering PFAS-seminarium

Meeting with Pernille Weiss-Ehler (Cabinet of Commissioner Jessika Roswall), Pernille Weiss-Ehler (Cabinet of Commissioner Jessika Roswall)

27 May 2025 · The Water Strategy and the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive

Meeting with Heléne Fritzon (Member of the European Parliament)

23 Apr 2025 · Möte om informationsutbyte och planering om gemensam aktivitet

Svenskt Vatten urges maintaining strict chemical criteria for water resilience

26 Mar 2025
Topic — Commission proposal to simplify sustainability reporting and amend environmental Taxonomy criteria.
Message — Svenskt Vatten requests keeping the existing chemical criteria instead of the proposed changes. They argue that excluding hazardous substances would undermine environmental protection and water safety.12
Why — Maintaining strict standards protects the quality of drinking water and utility infrastructure.3
Impact — The circular economy and water resilience strategies suffer from increased chemical pollution.4
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Svenskt Vatten demands polluter accountability and stronger water security

3 Mar 2025
Topic — The initiative creates a multi-annual plan to achieve a water-resilient European Union.
Message — Svenskt Vatten calls for stricter control-at-source of pollutants and an ambitious, broad restriction on PFAS. They argue for a common EU security plan to protect critical water infrastructure from hybrid warfare threats. Additionally, they emphasize the need for ring-fenced funding to address the sector's maintenance debt.123
Why — Implementing polluter responsibility would reduce the financial burden of water treatment for utilities.4
Impact — Industrial polluters and chemical producers would face significantly higher costs for hazardous substance management.5
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Meeting with Jessica Polfjärd (Member of the European Parliament)

13 Jan 2025 · Water policy

Meeting with Elisa Roller (Director Secretariat-General) and European Federation of National Associations of Water Services and Bureau Brussel Vewin - Unie van Waterschappen

10 Jan 2025 · PFAS in water

Meeting with Axel Hellman (Cabinet of Commissioner Jessika Roswall)

17 Dec 2024 · Upcoming Water Resilience initiative, the REACH revision, and the Circular Economy Act

Meeting with Jonas Sjöstedt (Member of the European Parliament)

5 Nov 2024 · PFAS

Meeting with Beatrice Timgren (Member of the European Parliament)

25 Sept 2024 · Swedish water politics

Meeting with Andreea Ticheru (Cabinet of Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager), Christiane Canenbley (Cabinet of Executive Vice-President Margrethe Vestager)

12 Mar 2024 · PFAS-ECHA

Meeting with Arunas Ribokas (Cabinet of Commissioner Virginijus Sinkevičius), Elena Montani (Cabinet of Commissioner Virginijus Sinkevičius) and

22 Jan 2024 · Zero pollution in the water sector, with focus on PFAS challenges

Meeting with Helena Braun (Cabinet of Vice-President Maroš Šefčovič), Lukas Visek (Cabinet of Vice-President Maroš Šefčovič) and

22 Jan 2024 · Zero pollution in the water sector, with focus on PFAS challenges

Meeting with Heléne Fritzon (Member of the European Parliament)

3 Jul 2023 · Möte med Svenskt Vatten (APA level)

Response to Initiative on EU taxonomy - environmental objective

2 May 2023

Svenskt Vatten (the Swedish Water&Wastewater Association) welcomes the possibility to comment the proposal. Please see the attached document.
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Response to Revision of the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive

14 Mar 2023

Svenskt Vattens most important messages ahead of the EU Parliament's and Councils continued work with the EU's wastewater directive Svenskt Vatten welcomes the revision of the Directive and the legislative proposal of the Commission. The adaptation of the directive and its alignment with the policy objectives of the European Green Deal, the climate change targets, the Zero Pollution Strategy, and the Circular Economy Action Plan are beneficial and will lead to greater coherence between the different initiatives. - Svenskt Vatten believes that the directive's most serious shortcoming is the lack of rules that protect agglomerations and UWWTP from the consequences of the ban on deterioration in the Water Framework Directive after the Weser ruling in the European Court of Justice. The lack of such rules in practice means a halt to population growth in municpalities and thus development of Swedish urban areas. The risk for cities to not fulfill the detailed and strict non-deterioration requirement in Article 4 of the WFD and its interpretation in the so called Weser-ruling, can be forecasted to increase significantly for many cities in Member States using the Water Framework Directive properly. The consequence will be that these cities have to stop their development and growth or will the treatment plant be overloaded. This will be the case when: - the cities have a growing population, the receiving water bodies have not high status and there are no alternative recipients or discharge point, and all feasible technological improvements for wastewater treatment are already in place. Then it is not anymore possible to compensate for the growing population by increasing the percentage of treatment in the UWWTP, already having a 98-99% removal of phosphorus, - the newly proposed EQS-directive with stricter requirement for EQS and more regulated chemical substances as e.g. for pharmaceuticals or Hg will be adopted. The Weser ruling has now an impact on cities Sweden, Finland and Demark and can be forecasted to soon affect Germany. - The design of the directive's nitrogen treatment requirements according to a one-size-fits-all principle must be abandoned and better adapted to regional and local needs assessed according to the EU Water Framework Directives and the Marine Strategy Framework Directive. Resource efficient natural nitrogen removal should be allowed. - Svenskt Vatten wants to highlight the European Commission's progressive demands for advanced treatment as well as the proposal that the producers that cause the need for it, the pharmaceutical and cosmetics producers should contribute to the financing through producer responsibility mechanism. Such a financing model will also accelerate the development of more pharmaceuticals being put on the market that are more easily degradable in normal treatment plants. But the proposal's conditions for extended producer responsibility should be adjusted so that the funding is sufficient. - In general, the proposal's control at source and upstream perspectives are welcomed. Persistent and other pollutants create severe problems for wastewater treatment, for the circularity of nutrients and organic material, irrigation water and other benefits, and for the green transition. The polluter pays principle is important to assert. - We note that the revised UWWTD will be very expensive for Swedish households with an increase in the water tariff of between 15-30%. More than half of the increase are measures with no environmental benefit for the water environment. The proposal involves an average cost increase in Sweden of between 40 and 70 per person per year, of which more than half goes to measures without environmental benefit (=nitrogen treatment that there is no need for according to the Swedish authorities). In general, the cost increase will be 2-3 times higher per person and year in rural municipalities compared to the biggest cities.
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Meeting with Nils Torvalds (Member of the European Parliament, Rapporteur)

15 Feb 2023 · Urban wastewater treatment

Meeting with Heléne Fritzon (Member of the European Parliament)

1 Feb 2023 · Svenskt vatten om avloppsdirektivet

Meeting with Emma Wiesner (Member of the European Parliament)

20 Jan 2023 · Möte om avloppsvattendirektivet

Meeting with Nils Torvalds (Member of the European Parliament, Rapporteur) and Kemira Oyj

20 Jan 2023 · Urban wastewater treatment

Meeting with Malin Björk (Member of the European Parliament)

7 Dec 2022 · sewage water and ground water

Meeting with Pär Holmgren (Member of the European Parliament)

6 Dec 2022 · Discussion on the sewage directive

Meeting with Karin Karlsbro (Member of the European Parliament)

6 Dec 2022 · EOV Current matters on the topic of clean water

Meeting with Heléne Fritzon (Member of the European Parliament)

5 Dec 2022 · Möte med Svenskt Vatten

Meeting with Karin Karlsbro (Member of the European Parliament)

12 May 2022 · Exchange of view concerning water quality

Meeting with Pär Holmgren (Member of the European Parliament)

17 Mar 2022 · Climate Policy, Water issues, Green Deal

Response to Measures to reduce microplastic pollution

17 Jan 2022

Svenskt Vatten wishes to comment as follows: - The provisions of Article 192.2 (TFEU) must be respected. - The lack of harmonised test methods should not delay action, as there is ample evidence of microplastics in all environmental compartments. - The EU has so far failed to tackle MP at source. The legal acts, this initiative wants to link with, are ‘end-of-pipe’ directives (UWWTD, SSD, GWD, EQSD). The proposed control-at-source measures for MP have until now been insufficient. - The initiative largely ignores the Green Deal by focussing on technical feasibility and enforcement instead of starting from EU ambitions on climate, zero pollution, circular economy, soil health, etc. It tackles symptoms, leaving the root causes (fast fashion, excessive car use) untouched. Source control measures for MP must have priority to protect the water cycle from MP contamination. All by-products from waste water treatment should be available for re-use in-line with circular economy goals. - While waste water treatment plants (WWTP) remove 80-99% of MP from the water phase, a substantial share is transferred to the sludge, still in small quantities, see https://www.svensktvatten.se/contentassets/22657293353d44ecaca7721d0b1c907c/svu-rt228.pdf . In certain locations, this may jeopardise the recycling of nutrients (P and N) and carbon, and lead to incineration as the only option, causing additional CO2 emissions. This contradicts the Green Deal, sewage sludge is important in many EU regions to increase the carbon content in soils (EU Soil strategy) - Combined sewers: MP may be directly released to surface water during overflow events. Svenskt Vatten supports the COM’s intention to reduce combined sewer overflows through the UWWTD. However, overflows are part of the safety in the system and necessary to reduce urban flood risks. They cannot be avoided completely. Tyre wear particles (TWP): - TWP are a larger MP source than synthetic textile fibres. - Separate sewers: TWP from road run-off may be released directly to surface water. Installing and maintaining gully filters other than in some hotspots would be a very expensive and unsustainable measure. - Nature-based solutions along road sites reduce/avoid storm water in sewers by leading it to ponds/rain gardens etc. In the light of climate change. Svenskt Vatten supports such measures. Svenskt Vatten welcome research to develop solutions on how to tackle all kind of pollutants in storm water. Textiles: -The obligation to equip washing machines with MP filters is only acceptable if the technology prevents any subsequent fibre spills in the urban water cycle (rinsing in sinks). - Microplastics are particles which will largely behave as any other particles entering the WWTP and stick to each other. To our knowledge, technologies to avoid mixing MP with sludge in WWTP can therefore not be developed. Plastic pellets: Greater control around the use, handling and management of pellets is required to implement source control measures. See for example PAS 510:2021. EPR: - The European Court of Auditors criticised the poor application of the polluter-pays principle (Special Report 12/2021). Encouragingly, the Commission considers EPR to finance downstream measures. - If action needs to be taken along the value chain, polluters should bear the costs. For the water sector, this includes road run-off filters and changes to sludge disposal management. - EurEau conducted a study covering EPR for TWP and plastic textile fibres. (https://www.eureau.org/resources/publications/eureau-publications/4380-deloitte-eureau-report-extended-producer-responsibility-modules-1-2-3/file) Economic impacts: - WW operators / municipalities face massive costs if they have to bear the burden of avoiding MP release to the environment (treatment of road run-off, sludge disposal management, MP waste disposal). - The protection of drinking water resources must become an objective of this initiative
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Response to Revision of the CO2 emission standards for cars and vans

5 Nov 2021

We welcome strict requirements in the EU’s CO2 emission performance standards, but we believe that EU legislation should be built around research-based well-to-wheel or life-cycle analysis on climate emissions. We are very critical of the persisting with the tailpipe approach, as proposed by the Commission. This is an outdated and misguided approach that steers towards specific technologies rather than towards reduced climate impact and improved energy efficiency. The proposal is competition-distorting and is far from technology neutral. It also misses its primary objective: to guide towards reduced climate emissions and away from fossil fuels. One consequence of the proposal is that renewable, sustainable alternatives, such as biomethane, are excluded from the market and denied the opportunity to contribute to the mitigation of climate change. It is in sharp contrast to REDII and scientific findings showing that, from all combinations of fuel/energy carriers and powertrains explored, biomethane represents one of the absolute lowest greenhouse gas intensive routes (https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/en/publication/eur-scientific-and-technical-research-reports/jec-well-wheels-report-v5). The European Commission's own science and knowledge service, the Joint Research Centre (JRC), asserts that well-to-wheel analysis is required to properly assess the climate impact of different technologies. Basing policy objectives and instruments on tailpipe emissions only, as the Commission proposes, is contrary to research recommendations. The new initiatives within “Fit for 55” – FuelEU Maritime and RefuelEU Aviation – propose GHG intensity and well-to-wake calculations. We welcome this research-based approach. These initiatives also highlight very well the illogicality of persisting with a tailpipe approach in road transport policies. The crediting scheme and carbon correction factor (CCF) have been dismissed far too lightly by the Commission. It is vital that such a mechanism be introduced so that a more accurate and technology neutral assessment of climate impact can be incorporated in the CO2 emission performance standards. In terms of environmental impact, the Commission ascertains that CO2 emissions (when measured under WLTP) increase with the CCF option. This is hardly surprising, since WLTP is based on a tailpipe measurement of emissions and thus does not capture the positive effects of renewable fuels. This is remarkably careless; in fact, it means that the entire impact assessment is founded on completely unsound and unscientific premises. We are convinced that all renewable and sustainable alternatives are needed to cope with the immense challenge of climate change and to reach our common environmental goals. There is not a single solution that can replace petrol and diesel as used today. Biomethane (biogas), renewable hydrogen, renewable electricity, and other renewable and sustainable alternatives are all necessary. Finally, replacing petrol and diesel with biomethane would not only benefit the environment and mitigate climate change directly. It would also stimulate vital investment and encourage environmental improvement in other industrial sectors – such as agriculture and waste handling – as a result of the additional benefits that biogas delivers: the recycling of plant and soil nutrients, reduced eutrophication, and improved biodiversity. Furthermore, production of biogas and biofertilizer leads to socio-economic benefits such as improved security of supply, increased rural development, job creation, and promotion of innovation. Among alternative fuels, only biogas has demonstrated, to date, such a deep and wide range of benefits to society. The Commission’s proposal based on tailpipe emissions hampers any efforts to advance biogas for mobility. Hence it also prevents the EU from taking advantage of all the cost-effective solutions that biogas has to offer in the transition to a sustainable society in a broad perspective.
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