The European Water Framework Directive and the DPSIR, a methodological approach to assess the risk of failing to achieve good ecological status

The European Water Framework Directive (WFD) establishes a framework for the protection of groundwater, inland surface waters, estuarine waters, and coastal waters. The WFD constitutes a new view of water resources management in Europe, based mainly upon ecological elements; its final objective is achieving at least ‘good ecological quality status’ for all water bodies by 2015. The approach to identify these water bodies includes, amongst others, the sub-division of a water body into smaller water bodies, according to pressures and resulting impacts. The analyses of pressures and impacts must consider how pressures would be likely to develop, prior to 2015, in ways that would place water bodies at risk of failing to achieve ecological good status, if appropriate programmes of measures were not designed and implemented. This contribution focuses on the use of the DPSIR (Driver, Pressure, State, Impact, Response) approach, in assessing the pressures and risk of failing the abovementioned objective, using the Basque (northern Spain) estuarine and coastal waters as a case study, using the following steps: (i) determination of the water bodies to be analysed; (ii) identification and description of the driving forces producing pressures over the region; (iii) identification of all existing pressures within the water bodies; (iv) identification, from them, of the most relevant pressures; (v) determination, from the relevant pressures, of those which are significant; (vi) assessing the impacts on water bodies (in terms of ecological and chemical impacts); and (vii) assessing the risk of failing the WFD objectives.