CONSTRAINTS ON SUCCESSFUL IMPLEMENTATION OF THE EU WATER FRAMEWORK DIRECTIVE: A CASE STUDY – LAKE BRUNNSJÖN IN CENTRAL SWEDEN / Hinder att nå framgång med EU:s ramdirektiv för vatten: En fallstudie – Brunnsjön i Mellansverige
A pilot study of local initiatives for a river basin in accordance with the European Water Framework Directive is being carried out in central Sweden. The catchment recipient suffers from eutrophication and Cyanobacteria-charged turbid water. Stakeholder involvement and several measures are proposed to enable the lake to attain a good chemical and ecological status. To some extent such involvement and measures have already been tested. The present load (1993-2000) of phosphorus (P) from agricultural land, 0.5 kg ha-1 y-1, needs to be reduced by roughly 40 % to come down to a level of double the background load derived from atmospheric deposition, unmanaged land and base-flow. Similarly, the magnitude of the present P load to the lake, 0.83 g m-2 y-1, needs to be reduced by 40% to reach ”non-dangerous” levels. However, since the lake is shallow (average depth 2.3 m) an even greater reduction is proposed. Although several management measures are possible to reduce loads, a much longer time span than the Water Framework Directive’s deadline of 2015 is needed for successfully reaching good ecological status. Besides natural science constraints, economic and social factors will hinder necessary measures to be implemented in due time as long as many of the measures are supposed to be voluntary and taken without financial backing.