The WFD is an essential piece of EU environmental legislation and is here to stay in the current form.
The European Commission states that in order to achieve the objectives of the Water Framework Directive, the natural functions of rivers must be restored. The Commission aims to do this by restoring at least 25,000 km of rivers into free-flowing rivers through the removal of primarily obsolete barriers and the restoration of floodplains and wetlands.
River Flow regimes have shaped the life history strategies of plants and animals over evolutionary time scales.
ECRR eNews #8 23.12.2022