AQUAMONEY - Development and Testing of Practical Guidelines for the Assessment of Environmental and Resource Costs and Benefits in the WFD

The main objective of this project was to develop and test practical and policy relevant guidelines for applying and implementing the WFD. This objective was achieved through the development of standard procedures and a protocol for good practice in decision appraisal for the WFD. Case studies at representative European river basins verified the developed guidelines. The outcomes of these case studies were used to

a) refine the guidelines for good practice in WFD decision appraisal, and

b) investigate the techniques for transferring economic values of environmental and resource costs and benefits from water body level to national and international river basin level and vice versa.

The project has also investigated the use of geographical information systems (GIS) to synthesise data from the case studies with available physical environment and census data so as to generate a Europe-wide map of expected benefits of improved water quality due to WFD implementation.