On 1 February 2018, the draft of the new EU Drinking Water Directive was published.
Article 10 of the EU Drinking Water Directive regulated the handling of materials and products in contact with drinking water. This has now been completely replaced by a new version as follows:
"Former Article 10 – Quality assurance of treatment equipment and materials (deleted)
The former Article 10 is deleted: it is considered that this Article is no longer necessary under Directive 98/83/EC and is partly replaced by new Article 10 on domestic distribution risk assessment. The necessary harmonisation will take place, instead, under internal market legislation with the issuance of standardisation mandates under the Construction Products Regulation. Until these standardisation mandates are executed and the harmonised standards are published in the Official Journal, the status quo will continue to apply."
In a first statement, the industry initiative „European Drinking Water“ calls for legally binding harmonised EU-wide rules for the safety of drinking water applications.
Volker Meyer, figawa Managing Director and Chairman of EDW, emphasised:
„We want to accelerate investment in innovative products, but the lack of harmonised regulations hinders our efforts. The measures proposed by the European Commission should be significantly strengthened to create a true single market for drinking water applications. For example, these measures would not cover a significant number of products in contact with drinking water that do not fall within the scope of the Construction Products Regulation. We urge policy makers to fill this gap in the harmonisation process”