Leisure time
Water quality at Europe’s bathing spots is mostly excellent
Bathers in the Birkwitz bathing lake. Across Europe, almost 94 percent of all bathing areas achieve excellent or good water quality. Photo
© Sebastian Kahnert/dpa-Zentralbild/dpa
Pack your swimming trunks: jumping into the cool water is usually safe at German and European bathing spots. But that could change in the future.
According to an EU study, in most cases you can splash and swim without worry in German and European bathing waters. In around 90 percent of bathing waters in Germany the water quality is excellent, in another almost 6 percent it is good, according to a report published on Tuesday by the European Commission and the European Environment Agency. In 37 (1.6 percent) of the total of around 1900 inland bathing waters,The quality of bathing areas and around 360 bathing areas on the coast of Germany was sufficient, while 7 (0.3 percent) were of poor quality. No information was available for 42 German bathing areas (1.8 percent).
The focus of the assessment is reportedly on bathing safety through monitoring bacteria that can cause serious illness in humans, rather than on general water quality.
94 percent of all bathing areas are at least good
Across Europe, almost 94 percent of all bathing areas have excellent or good water quality. According to the information, 344 or 1.6 percent of the approximately 22,000 bathing areas examined in the 27 EU countries, as well as Albania and Switzerland, have poor water quality.
According to the analysis, the quality of coastal waters is generally better than that of inland waters. The highest proportions of excellent bathing waters are found in Greece, Croatia, Cyprus and Austria. In Belgium, Bulgaria, Luxembourg, Malta, Austria and Romania, all bathing waters met at least the minimum quality standard in 2023. Since the adoption of the Bathing Water Directive in 2006, the proportion of bathing waters with poor water quality has initially declined and has been stable since 2015, it said. The assessment is based on data from bathing sites reported to the Environment Agency from the 2020 to 2023 bathing seasons.
Coastal waters better than inland waters
The director of the Copenhagen-based European Environment Agency, Leena Ylä-Mononen, said it was encouraging to see once again that European citizens could reap the benefits of over 40 years of strong investment in improving bathing water quality. “Continued regular monitoring by Member States of our coastal waters, rivers and lakes and other freshwater bodies will be crucial for our health and well-being, as well as for the environment, as climate change leads to more extreme weather conditions, such as heavy rainfall, which can affect water quality.”