The project combines research and pilot projects to improve groundwater quality and integrate groundwater protection into spatial planning. Pilot projects will include work with wetlands, nitrates and pollutants while a wide range of additional activities will ensure the effective dissemination of the lessons learnt.

Groundwater is constantly under pressure with the agricultural use of chemicals which leach down into groundwater being a major source of groundwater contamination. As land use and soil composition differ, creating many different conditions, there are no simple solutions to dealing with groundwater contamination. "Sustainable Groundwater Management,(Water4all) aims to significantly improve groundwater quality by preventing the continuing contamination of groundwater in the North Sea Region, integrating groundwater protection into the context of spatial planning and implementing the Water Framework Directive.

Expected Outcomes

Two principle outcomes are expected from Water4all. Firstly there is the development of knowledge and expertise, the outcomes of which will include the evaluation of existing measures, the evaluation of indicators on socio-economic effects of land use change, the small-scale implementation of change of land use, the role of groundwater as a receptor for nitrate leaching and transport, the effect of land use change from agriculture to permanent grasslands, and the understanding of the movement of pollutants through a catchment area from source. The second outcome is the development of solutions for sustainable groundwater management. This will include the development of a standardised format for data collection and an Internet platform ?European groundwater protection ? Water4all? for easy access to research results and the inclusion of relevant stakeholders in the subsequent dialogue. The results from Water4all will be included in a Guidelines Handbook that will be the first step towards a future Decision Support System for spatial planning to protect groundwater.

Activities

Water4all is divided into four sections: Preparation, Planning, Implementation and Analysis and Finalising, with project management and reporting running during the whole duration of the project. Preparation will entail the first partner meeting and involve the co-ordination team and experts from different partners so central staff gain a clear picture of the project implementation process as well as the co-ordination of future events. Planning will identify previous research results related to project activities, will select specific catchment areas, arrange research and implementation locations and test models, drawing up standardised data collection criteria and define the character and content of the internet platform to ensure accessibility of results. Implementation and Analysis is divided up into a number of areas. There are to be four pilot projects, one focusing on small-scale implementation of the change from arable land to wetland, where research is on the increased feeding of the groundwater and keeping the water in areas for longer. The second pilot is the implementation of declarations specifying certain nitrate levels, land use types and grazing pressure to determine the land use types that leach the least nitrates. The third pilot is the understanding of the movement of pollutants through a catchment area in order to understand the importance of groundwater as a transport medium for various chemicals. The fourth project is the standardisation of data, collection methods and results to achieve comparability over northern Europe. Other activities carried out are to include the production and use of a guidance handbook, stakeholder involvement, traineeships, numerous partner and expert meetings and transnational seminars. The final stage of the project is Finalising, in which the final development of the Guideline Handbook on comparable results and recommendations for land use will be produced and published, and the final transnational seminar, under the theme of "Integrating results in relation to spatial planning", will take place.

Reported Outcomes

As the project enters into its final stage of implementation, so do the activities carried out, with results becoming more visible and inspiring interesting spin-off effects. Testing of different methods for the improvement of groundwater quality have continued with the focus being on small-scale implementation and research on change from arable to wetland; implementation on declarations specifying a certain nitrate level, land use type and grazing pressure; and understanding the movement of pollutants through a catchment area. Throughout this work reducing Nitrate levels has been an important focus. Learning from each other?s knowledge and experience has been in the heart of the Traineeship activities. The focuse was on afforestation, organic farming and water supply; innovative initiatives for agriculture management in order to protect the water environment and the links between the Water Framework Directive and groundwater management. These last 3 of a series of partner meetings, strengthened the understanding among partners on various practices applied in the different countries and inspired for improvement of own implementation practices. All partners are also actively involved in the collection and analysis of data for the main final project product - the Handbook on Groundwater Protection Measures. This handbook is intended to integrate recommendations for groundwater protection integrated with spatial planning measures in groundwater areas. It is aimed that this Handbook will influence regional decision-making in the participating countries. To this end, an interesting spin-off is the participation in the UK DEFRA consultation process on Catchment - Sensitive Farming, where the need to give greater consideration to groundwater protection in planning of the future agriculture of the UK has been highlighted. And in the US, following a visit to the Water4all project in Aalborg, they feel inspired by the European example of being able to deliver untreated groundwater for drinking purposes to the citizens and consider copying this good practice both in Delaware and New York County. The need for more technical guidance and good examples (such as those presented by Water4all) to tackle the WFD implementation was once again highlighted by a representative from DG Environment, Marine and Water Unit during the final conference of the Water4all project. During this conference, the need to take forward the results from the project to national working groups from the participating countries was stressed. The project was furthermore invited to take part in the Commission's working group on the Groundwater Directive.