What are other member states doing to develop groundwater classification systems?

The other twenty six Member States and Norway are also developing groundwater classification systems. The requirements for groundwater classification as set out in the GWDD are notably different to surface water classification. For surface water, standards are needed that define the boundaries between the various status classes. Groundwater status does not simply or directly reflect ecology but takes account of the needs of a variety of dependent receptors, other "uses" of the groundwater body and its general quality.

As a consequence, groundwater classification is carried out at the groundwater body scale and it is up to individual Member States to use their own classification systems, meeting the requirements set out in the WFD and GWDD, to determine threshold values for each groundwater body.

For groundwater chemical status, the Threshold Values derived by individual Member States are then used as triggers for further investigation to determine whether the conditions for good chemical status are being met or not. They do not define in isolation the boundary between good and poor status.

The UK and Ireland have been working with other Member States on an EU funded project (BRIDGE) to develop a common methodology for deriving Threshold Values for groundwater chemical status. The outputs from this project will feed into the production of guidance as part of the Common Implementation Strategy. This should ensure there is a consistent approach across the EU to the development of groundwater chemical threshold values. See UKTAG Guidance paper

http://www.wfduk.org/stakeholder_reviews/stakeholder_review_1-2007/LibraryPublicDocs/gw_chemical_classification_paper_final_draft

It should be noted that there is no intercalibration process for groundwater. Intercalibration is the EU wide process to set harmonized ecological quality criteria for the protection and restoration targets for all surface waters. This requires a common interpretation of what is "good ecological status" of water, to be able to compare the results from the different Member States.