EU's Strategy for Water Resilience

Jacopo Belli - November 18, 2025

Introduction

The European water crisis has become systemic due to the intensification of events such as more frequent and severe droughts, persistent pollutants, and obsolete networks that are progressively undermining public health, agriculture, industry, and biodiversity. To address these threats, on 4 June 2025 the European Commission presented the Water Resilience Strategy (WRS), aimed at ensuring water security and resilience while preparing the European Union (EU) for critical water-related scenarios. The strategy is built around three recurring lines of action: restoring and protecting the water cycle, building a water-smart economy, and ensuring equitable access to clean water. [1]

The WRS provides a framework to reduce water consumption and improve efficiency by 10% by 2030, strengthening efforts to curb losses and modernize infrastructure through public and private investments, and integrating digital solutions such as monitoring and artificial intelligence. In parallel, the European Investment Bank (EIB) has announced a commitment of approximately €15 billion for 2025–2027 to support projects that enhance the resilience and competitiveness of Europe’s water systems. Criticism has emerged regarding the non-binding nature of some targets, which is seen as a limitation on the strategy’s ambition — a congenital issue of international law by its very nature. [2]

The WRS aligns with the European Green Deal and adaptation policies, ensuring full implementation of the acquis Communautaire (notably the Water Framework Directive, the Floods Directive, etc.) and periodic review processes. Beginning in December 2025, the Commission will convene a biennial Water Resilience Forum to assess progress and the application of these measures across all levels of government, business, and civil society. For policymakers, the end-of-year forum represents a crucial checkpoint, measuring the readiness of Member States to translate EU guidance into technically and economically sustainable national plans. [3]

Policy Architecture of the WRS

The Water Resilience Strategy (WRS) is a Communication from the European Commission that serves as a non-binding policy framework to make the European Union “water-resilient”. It does not introduce new legal obligations but rather organizes an implementation and coordination pathway, including biennial reviews through the Water Resilience Forum (starting in December 2025) and a public “Actions Tracker” ensuring transparency on the progress made by the Commission, Member States, and stakeholders. [4]

In this context, the strategy functions as a governance tool that defines priorities, responsibilities, and timelines. The anchoring to the EU water acquis is explicit: the WRS requires full implementation of the Water Framework Directive (WFD – Directive 2000/60/EC), the cornerstone of EU water policy. It introduces river-basin management, multi-annual management cycles, and the goal of achieving the “good status” of water bodies. Article 9 establishes the principle of cost recovery for water services, which Member States must reflect in tariff policies;[5] it also recalls the Floods Directive (Directive 2007/60/EC), which sets out a three-stage cycle (preliminary risk assessment, hazard mapping, and risk management planning) updated every six years, with the aim of reducing and managing impacts on health, environment, cultural heritage, and the economy[6]; furthermore, it references the recast Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive (Directive (EU) 2024/3019), in force since 1 January 2025, which raises minimum standards, introduces energy-neutrality targets for 2045, and integrates an extended producer responsibility (EPR) scheme to finance the removal of micropollutants. [7] Finally, it complements the Regulation (EU) 2020/741 on water reuse in agriculture, which establishes minimum quality standards, risk management requirements, and monitoring obligations. The WRS does not replace these acts but reinforces their implementation and coherence, calling for the closure of enforcement gaps and the avoidance of regulatory overlap. [8]

At the level of objectives, the Commission invites Member States to pursue a 10% reduction in water abstraction and consumption by 2030, an indicative, non-binding target, to be translated into national targets for loss reduction, reuse, and rationalization of sectoral consumption.

The guiding logic is the principle of “water efficiency first”: before expanding supply, efficiency and demand management must be maximized. Supply-side options such as reuse, desalination, and rainwater harvesting are to be assessed case by case considering their cost–benefit balance and energy and environmental impacts, with progress reported in the Actions Tracker, ensuring comparability and transparency. [9]

Economic instruments represent a central lever. In line with Article 9 of the WFD and the polluter pays principle, the WRS calls for fair yet efficient-oriented pricing structures and for the proper internalization of environmental costs. OECD/EU evidence shows that well-designed pricing is decisive for achieving environmental objectives and ensuring the financial sustainability of water services.[10]

Among the cross-cutting enablers, the strategy identifies digitalization and data interoperability as key: smart metering and leak detection, early-warning systems, and the use of AI and analytics for scenario forecasting and decision support. These digital tools are to be integrated into basin planning and climate adaptation and Zero Pollution policies. The goal is to reduce losses, optimize allocation, and prevent crises through reliable, timely, and comparable data — thus supporting implementation across all governance levels.

Finance constitutes the other pillar of the plan architecture. The WRS guides the combined use of EU funds (Cohesion Policy, InvestEU, CAP/Rural Development, RRF where applicable) and private capital, while the EIB has announced its €15 billion program for 2025–2027 in favor of sustainable, technology-enabled water solutions, with an expected leverage effect on commercial investors. [11]

The WRS warns that without significant public and private investment across all phases of water management, progress towards water resilience will be too slow and lack tangible impact. Currently, total investments in water-related measures from the EU, the EIB, and national budgets amount to approximately €55 billion per year (2022 prices), while the additional investment needed for full implementation of EU water legislation is estimated at €23 billion per year, roughly 0.1% of EU GDP. Investments must cover all stages of water management, be planned in an integrated manner, consider future climate scenarios and risk assessments, and support innovation and technology development in the water sector. [12]

As for roles and responsibilities, the European Commission defines the strategic direction, coordinates and monitors progress through the Forum and Action Tracker, and supports implementation through guidance, standards, and financial instruments. Member States translate this direction into national plans and targets, selecting intervention portfolios (loss reduction, reuse, sustainable solutions) and harmonizing data. Target sectors (agriculture, industry, urban and others) are called upon to strengthen efficiency and reuse, including through transition packages and CAP-related water management measures.

Overall, the WRS combines strategic guidance, enforcement of the acquis, economic instruments, and catalytic finance, enabled by data and digital technologies, to steer systems and users toward efficiency, reuse, and resilience to water-related risks, with a political review starting in December 2025.

Instruments and Measures: What Changes for Key Sectors

The Water Resilience Strategy translates the “water efficiency first” principle into operational interventions across three main sectors: urban, agricultural, and industrial/energy, supported by digitalization, interoperable data, and finance.

For the urban sector, the priority is to drastically reduce water losses and modernize distribution networks through the use of sensors, smart metering, and leak-detection algorithms, mobilizing both public and private capital. This responds to a European context in which average losses amount to about one quarter of the water supplied, with very high peaks in certain areas — a situation that calls for rapid action on monitoring and pipe replacement.[13] The revision of the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive expands its scope to agglomerations with fewer than 1,000 inhabitants, introduces quaternary treatment for micropollutants financed through Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) schemes for sectors such as cosmetics and pharmaceuticals, establishes energy neutrality targets for treatment plants by 2045, and strengthens health monitoring (e.g. pathogenic parameters). These measures significantly raise the standards of quality and resilience across the urban water cycle but require multi-year planning and technological upgrading of treatment facilities.[14]

In the agricultural sector, the WRS focuses on on-farm water efficiency and the adoption of practices and technologies capable of reducing withdrawals while stabilizing yields and quality under conditions of recurrent drought. The Commission encourages Member States to make full use of CAP Strategic Plans, EIP-AGRI innovation networks, independent advisory services, and nature-based solutions to retain water within the landscape, alongside precision irrigation, remote sensing, and decision-support systems.

However, political and distributive tensions remain at certain stages of the process, proposals for new “water-saving” subsidies have been recalibrated, while parts of the scientific and environmental community call for a better balance between technological incentives and the agroecological transition. For policymakers, the operational goal is the definition of sector-specific national targets consistent with the overarching 10% reduction in water use by 2030, supported by comparable measurement methodologies.[15]

or the industry and energy sectors, the strategy promotes water consumption audits, internal recycling and external reuse, industrial symbiosis, and the establishment of minimum efficiency standards in water-intensive industries. Examples include the consideration of water-efficiency requirements for data centers and the invitation to integrate “water-smart” criteria into permits, Best Available Techniques (BAT), and green finance schemes. In parallel, the Commission encourages the use of digital platforms to measure, compare, and reduce water abstraction across supply chains, supported by harmonized indicators for benchmarking and disclosure.[16]

Water reuse becomes a cross-cutting lever within the strategy. Regulation (EU) 2020/741 sets minimum requirements and a risk management framework for agricultural irrigation, ensuring public transparency. Building on this foundation, the WRS calls for the scaling up of projects and interconnections, given that the current share of water reuse in the EU remains low compared to its potential. The combination with desalination processes is assessed case by case, taking into account energy costs, environmental benefits, and basin-level resilience.[17]

All sectors rely on data and digitalization. The “Actions Tracker” and WISE platforms enhance comparability and transparency, while at the operational level, smart metering, predictive modelling, and early-warning systems are essential to reduce losses, allocate water among competing uses, and prevent crises.

The European Environment Agency (EEA) further notes that success will depend on the integration of climate adaptation, ecosystem restoration, and Zero Pollution objectives, connecting demand- and supply-side measures at the river-basin scale. In summary, compared with the current status quo, the WRS raises the regulatory bar for the urban water cycle, establishes an operational framework to make efficiency and reuse scalable in agriculture, and tightens expectations for industrial water stewardship. Effective implementation will depend on the ability to link investments (including those supported by the EIB), technical standards, and data governance, translating the EU-wide −10% target into measurable and verifiable national programs.[18]

Finance, Timelines, and Controversial Issues

The financial pillar of the Water Resilience Strategy aims to mobilize public and private capital to bridge an estimated €23 billion annual investment gap, ensuring the effective implementation of the EU water acquis and the modernization of networks, treatment systems, and monitoring infrastructure. To support this effort, the European Investment Bank (EIB) has announced a dedicated €15 billion program for 2025–2027, focused on water infrastructure, nature-based solutions, and enabling technologies, with an expected leverage effect on commercial investors. The European Commission also calls for the combined use of Cohesion Funds, InvestEU, and sectoral measures, embedding the “water efficiency first” principle among the criteria for investment selection and prioritization.

The WRS sets out its governance timeline with a biennial Water Resilience Forum starting in December 2025, and a public “Actions Tracker” that makes visible the progress of actions — from interventions on leak reduction to the digitalization of systems. In parallel, related legislative dossiers are advancing: the recast Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive was adopted at the end of 2024 and entered into force in 2025, establishing clear milestones for the coverage of agglomerations, advanced treatment, and Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) for micropollutants. The text extends collection and treatment to agglomerations of more than 1,000 population equivalents by 2035, makes tertiary treatment (nitrogen and phosphorus) mandatory for plants ≥150,000 p.e. by 2039, and introduces quaternary treatment for the removal of micropollutants by 2045, with the simultaneous objective of energy neutrality for the sector and a minimum contribution of 80% of the additional costs to be borne by pharmaceutical and cosmetics producers through EPR schemes.[19]

The non-binding nature of the −10% water abstraction and consumption reduction target by 2030 is one of the most debated points: for some stakeholders, it serves as a useful guideline for national action, while for others, it risks leading to uneven implementation among Member States, particularly where investment needs are higher or data remain incomplete. The Commission responds by emphasizing the use of comparable indicators, the transparency ensured by the Actions Tracker, and the role of the Forum in fostering convergence and peer pressure.

Meanwhile, at the sectoral level, discussions continue the definition of minimum water-efficiency standards for water-intensive industries (for example, data centers) and on the possible introduction, within the framework of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), of “transition packages” to support investments in precision irrigation and water-smart agricultural practices. The content of these measures was the subject of drafts and consultations in 2025 and remains politically sensitive due to the potential impact on costs and incentive structures.

The European Scenario

In the European debate on water resilience, some countries are playing key roles that help to interpret, by analogy or contrast, the broader dynamics within the Union. France positions itself as a “norm setter” with its Plan Eau 2023–2030, which internalizes the direction of the EU Strategy and translates it into an explicit objective of a 10% reduction in water abstraction by 2030, alongside measures on reuse and local governance. This trajectory provides an operational benchmark for other Member States tasked with making the “water efficiency first” principle of the WRS a concrete reality.[20]

At the opposite end of the resilience spectrum, the case of Bulgaria illustrates the “cost of inaction”: losses linked to infrastructure inefficiency and repeated water crises have driven institutional reforms and emergency plans. There, the priority is not the renewal of policy instruments but the reduction of infrastructure debt: replacing pipelines, measuring, and reducing leakages; otherwise, any efficiency policy remains ineffective. his serves as a useful warning for Southern European regions with aging networks, where the scalability of investments — public, EIB, and private — will determine the credibility of national targets. [21]

The Iberian block offers two complementary laboratories.

In Catalonia, the management of the 2023–2025 drought accelerated a “supply resilience” portfolio composed of desalination (including floating plants) and water reuse, followed by a gradual easing of restrictions after the 2025 rains. This represents an interesting model in contexts where urban and tourism-related demand makes a “efficiency-only” approach socially costly.

In Portugal’s Algarve region, the government has begun to partially lift restrictions on agricultural withdrawals following resource recovery, while maintaining investments in desalination, interconnections, and network repairs. The overarching strategy is to avoid the emergency–relief pendulum through structural investments and demand management. [22]

In the Eastern Mediterranean, Greece and Cyprus demonstrate what it means to plan under conditions of chronic stress. Around Athens, reservoirs approached historic lows in 2025, prompting the government to adopt a new National Water Strategy focused on supply security, efficiency, and tariff reform; [23] Cyprus, facing critical summer reserves and high tourist demand, has introduced mobile desalination units and medium-term programs aimed at expanding capacity and water reuse.[24]

Italy embodies the profile of a “complex implementer”: it has included in its National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP) a specific line dedicated to loss reduction and digitalization (M2C4–I.4.2), and in 2025 strengthened coordination with the Special Commissioner for Water Scarcity. The Italian case clearly highlights two enabling conditions of the WRS: bankable project pipelines and administrative capacity. Without these, the €15 billion from the EIB and EU funds cannot be transformed into construction projects or measurable KPIs. [25]

On the economic governance front, the Netherlands are using pricing as a signal of scarcity: in 2025, water board taxes were increased, and between 2026 and 2027, the cap on drinking water taxation for large consumers will be abolished, thereby broadening the tax base. This is an experiment in water pricing consistent with Article 9 of the Water Framework Directive (WFD), which other countries are also considering for social and industrial reasons.[26]

Finally, Luxembourg reminds us that resilience does not equate to temporary abundance: in 2025, drinking water reserves were well replenished thanks to rainy winters, yet the country is still discussing source diversification and quality protection from a long-term perspective. It offers a valuable lesson for Central and Northern European countries: to invest before scarcity becomes structural and to maintain high ecological quality in water bodies, as also emphasized in the latest EU and EEA reports.[27]

The WRS provides a common framework (encompassing objectives, enforcement of the acquis, finance, and data) but trajectories remain differentiated. Where losses are high and governance is weak, the priority is to rebuild basic infrastructure; where systems are more advanced, the added value lies in scalable water reuse, digitalization, and credible pricing signals. The political litmus test of December 2025 will assess whether this diversity of approaches converges toward comparable results in relation to the EU-wide −10% target and the indicators of water quality and security.[28]

Conclusions and Outlook (Towards 16 December 2025)

The Water Resilience Strategy today provides a coherent framework for action, capable of combining the enforcement of the acquis with new investment priorities. The challenge is no longer to define the course, but to translate it into measurable national programs, ensuring transparent progress tracking through the Actions Tracker. This requires interoperable data, multilevel governance, and administrative capacity, since without bankable project design, even the best instruments remain potential rather than operational.

The Forum of 16 December 2025 represents the first political milestone in consolidating this trajectory. It is expected to deliver a mandate for the national translation of the water-saving target using comparable metrics, provide guidance on the pipeline of financeable projects in light of the estimated structural investment needs and the EIB’s intervention, and establish operational alignment with legislative dossiers already in force, starting with the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive, which broadens its scope, introduces micropollutant removal through EPR, and sets the sector on a path toward energy neutrality by 2045.

In parallel, the Council may accelerate convergence on common criteria for water reuse (Regulation 2020/741), clarify expectations regarding digitalization and early-warning systems, and strengthen the role of the Forum and the Tracker as mechanisms of transparency and “peer pressure”.

To assess the credibility of the path beyond Brussels, attention will focus on concrete signals: the adoption of national targets on consumption and losses consistent with the EU-wide −10% objective; the alignment of tariff mechanisms with the principles of efficiency and cost recovery; progress in creating relevant data and in the digitalization of processes (smart metering, leak detection, early-warning systems); and the capacity to integrate the urban, agricultural, and industrial domains in overall water consumption management.

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[1]European Commission (2025) Water resilience strategy.Brussels :European Commission (DG COMM/DG ENV).

[2]ANSA English (2025) ‘EU urges smarter water use, climate change strains supplies’, 6 June 2025.

[3]Ruminantia (2025) ‘Presentata la strategia per la resilienza idrica dell’UE’, 5 June 2025.

[4]European Commission (2025) Water Resilience Strategy – Actions Tracker. Brussels: DG Environment.

[5]EUR-Lex (2000) Directive 2000/60/EC (Water Framework Directive)

[6]European Commission/EEA (2025) Floods Directive- WISE Freshwater overview (six-year cycles; 2022–2027 plans).

[7]European Commission (2025) Water Framework Directive - overview. Brussels: DG Environment.

[8]ibidem

[9]Financial Times (2025) ‘Brussels tells EU capitals to cut water use by 10% in face of droughts’, 6 June 2025.

[10]OECD (2024) Cost recovery for water services under the Water Framework Directive. Paris: OECD/EC.

[11]European Investment Bank (2025) ‘EIB Group backs more than €15 billion in new investment’, 17 July 2025.

[12] European Commission (2025) European Water Resilience Strategy, 3.

[13]Financial Times (2025) Brussels tells EU capitals to cut water use by 10%; average losses ~25%; reuse ~2.4%. London: FT.

[14]European Commission (2025) Urban wastewater - Topic page. Brussels: DG Environment.

[15]European Environment Agency (2024) Europe’s state of water 2024. Copenhagen: EEA.

[16]Reuters (2025) EIB commits €15bn; data-centre water-saving standards noted; €23bn/yr needs. 4 June.

[17]WISE Freshwater (2024) Water reuse. Copenhagen/Brussels: EEA/EC.

[18]IEEP (2025) Strengthening EU’s water resilience through sustainable farming practices. Brussels: Institute for European Environmental Policy.

[19]Council of the EU (2024) ‘Urban wastewater: Council adopts new rules for more efficient treatment’, 5 Nov 2024.

[20]United Nations SDGs (2025) ‘Plan Eau 2023–2030 (France): 10% abstraction reduction by 2030’.

[21]Bloomberg (2025) ‘A Water Crisis in Bulgaria Is a Warning for Europe’, 20 Aug 2025. Accessed 8 Oct 2025.

[22]Catalan News (2024) ‘Drought emergency measures lifted…’, 7 May 2024.

[23]The Water Diplomat (2025) ‘Greece agrees new National Water Strategy’, 30 Jul 2025.

[24]Reuters (2025) ‘Cyprus receives mobile desalination units from UAE’, 26 May 2025; and ‘Cyprus steps up desalination’, 2 Sep 2025.

[25]Commissario straordinario siccità (2025) Portale e Relazione 2025.

[26]Government of the Netherlands (2025) ‘2026 Tax Plan: businesses pay tax on more drinking water’, 16 Sep 2025.

[27]RTL Today (2025) ‘Luxembourg’s drinking water reserves well filled’, 2025.

[28]Reuters (2025) ‘Europe’s water resources under pressure…’, 4 Feb 2025.