Federal Act
on the Protection of Waters
(Waters Protection Act, WPA)

The pur­pose of this Act is to pro­tect wa­ters against harm­ful ef­fects. In par­tic­u­lar it aims:

a.

to pre­serve the health of people, an­im­als and plants;

b.

to guar­an­tee the sup­ply and eco­nom­ic use of drink­ing wa­ter and wa­ter re­quired for oth­er pur­poses;

c.

to pre­serve the nat­ur­al hab­it­ats of in­di­gen­ous fauna and flora;

d.

to pre­serve wa­ters suit­able as a hab­it­at for fish;

e.

to pre­serve wa­ters as an ele­ment of the land­scape;

f.

to en­sure the ir­rig­a­tion of ag­ri­cul­tur­al land;

g.

to per­mit the use of wa­ters for leis­ure pur­poses;

h.

to en­sure the nat­ur­al func­tion­ing of the hy­dro­lo­gic­al cycle.

This Act ap­plies to all sur­face and un­der­ground wa­ters.

Every­one is re­quired to take all the care due in the cir­cum­stances to avoid any harm­ful ef­fects to wa­ters.

Any­one who causes meas­ures to be taken un­der this Act must bear the costs.

In this Act:

a.

sur­face wa­ters: means wa­ter bod­ies and their beds in­clud­ing the bot­toms and banks, to­geth­er with the fauna and flora liv­ing there;

b.

un­der­ground wa­ters: means ground­wa­ter (in­clud­ing spring wa­ter), aquifer, lower and up­per con­fin­ing beds;

c.

det­ri­ment­al ef­fects: means pol­lu­tion and any oth­er in­ter­ven­tion which harms the char­ac­ter or func­tion of wa­ter;

d.

pol­lu­tion: means any det­ri­ment­al phys­ic­al, chem­ic­al or bio­lo­gic­al change in the nature of wa­ter;

e.

waste wa­ter:means wa­ter which has been altered by do­mest­ic, in­dus­tri­al, com­mer­cial, ag­ri­cul­tur­al or oth­er uses, as well as that which flows with such wa­ter in sew­ers, and pre­cip­it­a­tion wa­ter flow­ing off built-up or sealed area;

f.

pol­luted waste wa­ter:means waste wa­ter which may pol­lute wa­ters in­to which it flows;

g.

farm ma­nure: means li­quid ma­nure, stable ma­nure stem­ming from an­im­al hus­bandry as well as li­quids emit­ted by fod­der silo;

h.

flow rate Q₃₄₇:means the flow rate which, av­er­aged over ten years, is reached or ex­ceeded on an av­er­age of 347 days per year and which is not sub­stan­tially af­fected by dam­ming, with­draw­al or sup­ply of wate;

i.

per­man­ent flow:means a flow rate Q₃₄₇ which is great­er than zero;

k.

re­sid­ual flow:means the flow rate of a wa­ter­course which re­mains after one or sev­er­al with­draw­als of wa­ter;

l.

re­quired wa­ter en­dow­ment:means the amount of wa­ter re­quired to en­sure the main­ten­ance of a par­tic­u­lar re­sid­ual flow after with­draw­al of wa­ter;

m.⁵

re­hab­il­it­a­tion:means the re-es­tab­lish­ment by means of civil en­gin­eer­ing of the nat­ur­al func­tions of chan­nelled, straightened, covered or cul­ver­ted sur­face wa­ters.

If re­quired in the in­terests of na­tion­al de­fence or in the event of emer­gen­cies, the Fed­er­al Coun­cil may, by or­din­ance, provide for ex­emp­tions from the pro­vi­sions of this Act.

¹It is pro­hib­ited to in­tro­duce in­to a body of wa­ter, either dir­ectly or in­dir­ectly any sub­stances which may pol­lute it; the in­filt­ra­tion of such sub­stances is also pro­hib­ited.

²It is also pro­hib­ited to store or spread such sub­stances out­side a body of wa­ter if there is a genu­ine risk of wa­ter pol­lu­tion.

¹Pol­luted waste wa­ter must be treated. It may only be dis­charged or in­filt­rated in­to a body of wa­ter with the au­thor­isa­tion of the can­ton­al au­thor­ity.

²Non-pol­luted waste wa­ter must be dis­charged by in­filt­ra­tion ac­cord­ing to the in­struc­tions of the can­ton­al au­thor­ity. If loc­al con­di­tions do not per­mit this, such non-pol­luted wa­ter may be dis­charged in­to sur­face wa­ters; in this case re­ten­tion meas­ures must be taken if pos­sible so as to en­sure a steady dis­charge in the event of high in­flow. The dis­charge of wa­ter that is not shown on a com­mun­al drain­age plan ap­proved by the can­ton re­quires the con­sent of the can­ton­al au­thor­ity.⁶

³ The can­tons shall ar­range the draw­ing up of com­mun­al and, if re­quired, re­gion­al drain­age plans.⁷

¹The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall spe­cify the wa­ter qual­ity re­quire­ments for sur­face and un­der­ground wa­ters.

²It shall en­act reg­u­la­tions on:

a.

the dis­charge of waste wa­ter in­to bod­ies of wa­ter;

b.

the in­filt­ra­tion of waste wa­ter;

c.

sub­stances which may ac­cord­ing to the meth­od of their use enter in­to wa­ter and which, by reas­on of their prop­er­ties or the quant­it­ies used, risk pol­lut­ing wa­ters or im­pair­ing the op­er­a­tion of waste wa­ter treat­ment plants.

³ An au­thor­isa­tion for plant pro­tec­tion products and biocid­al products (pesti­cides) must be re­viewed if:

a.

the lim­it value of 0.1 µg/l for pesti­cides or their de­grad­a­tion products is re­peatedly and widely ex­ceeded in wa­ters used or in­ten­ded for use for drink­ing wa­ter; or

b.

the eco­tox­ic­o­lo­gic­al lim­it val­ues for pesti­cides are re­peatedly and widely ex­ceeded in sur­face wa­ters.⁹

⁴ The new de­cision on au­thor­isa­tion must en­sure com­pli­ance with the lim­it val­ues.¹⁰

⁵ If it is not pos­sible to achieve com­pli­ance with the lim­it val­ues by im­pos­ing con­di­tions of use, the au­thor­isa­tion for the pesti­cides in ques­tion or, in the case of plant pro­tec­tion products, the ap­prov­al of their act­ive sub­stances must be with­drawn.¹¹

⁶ If a meas­ure un­der para­graph 5 would ser­i­ously re­duce do­mest­ic sup­plies of im­port­ant ag­ri­cul­tur­al crops, the Fed­er­al Coun­cil may re­frain from with­draw­ing au­thor­isa­tion or ap­prov­al for a lim­ited peri­od of time.¹²

¹The can­tons shall be re­spons­ible for the con­struc­tion of pub­lic sew­ers and cent­ral plants for the treat­ment of pol­luted waste wa­ter:

a.

from build­ing zones;

b.

from ex­ist­ing groups of build­ings out­side build­ing zones for which the spe­cial pro­ced­ures for the dis­pos­al of waste wa­ter (Art. 13) provide in­suf­fi­cient pro­tec­tion for wa­ters or are not eco­nom­ic­ally vi­able.

^1bis They shall en­sure that these plants are op­er­ated eco­nom­ic­ally.¹³

²In isol­ated or sparsely in­hab­ited re­gions, pol­luted waste wa­ter must be treated by sys­tems oth­er than cent­ral waste wa­ter treat­ment plants provided that the pro­tec­tion of sur­face and un­der­ground wa­ters is guar­an­teed.

³If private sew­ers also serve the pub­lic in­terest, their status is equal to that of pub­lic sew­ers.

⁴ …¹⁴

¹Pol­luted waste wa­ter which ori­gin­ates in an area served by pub­lic sew­ers shall be dis­charged in­to such sew­ers.

²The areas served by pub­lic sew­ers shall in­clude:

a.

build­ing zones;

b.

oth­er zones as soon as they are con­nec­ted to the pub­lic sew­ers (Art. 10 para. 1, let. b);

c.

oth­er zones where con­nec­tion to the pub­lic sew­ers is ex­pedi­ent and reas­on­able.

³The per­son re­spons­ible for the sew­ers is ob­liged to ac­cept waste wa­ter and con­vey it to the ap­pro­pri­ate cent­ral waste wa­ter treat­ment plant.

¹Those re­spons­ible for waste wa­ter which does not meet the re­quire­ments laid down for dis­charge in­to the drain­age sys­tem must sub­ject such waste wa­ter to pre-treat­ment. Such pre-treat­ment shall be reg­u­lated by the can­tons.

²The can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies shall de­cide on the ap­pro­pri­ate way to dis­pose of waste wa­ter which is not suited for treat­ment by a cent­ral wa­ter treat­ment plant.

³Non-pol­luted waste wa­ter with per­man­ent flow shall not be passed through a cent­ral waste wa­ter treat­ment plant either dir­ectly or in­dir­ectly. The can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies may au­thor­ise ex­cep­tions to this rule.

⁴In a farm com­pris­ing a sub­stan­tial stock of cattle or pigs, do­mest­ic waste wa­ter may be used ag­ri­cul­tur­ally to­geth­er with the li­quid ma­nure (Art. 14) provided that:

a.

res­id­en­tial or in­dus­tri­al build­ings and their ad­join­ing land are situ­ated in an area clas­si­fied as an ag­ri­cul­tur­al zone or the com­mun­al au­thor­ity is tak­ing the ne­ces­sary meas­ures, par­tic­u­larly in the field of area plan­ning, to clas­si­fy the build­ings and their ad­join­ing land in an ag­ri­cul­tur­al zone;

b.

stor­age ca­pa­city is suf­fi­cient for do­mest­ic waste wa­ter too and the waste wa­ter is used on land which is either owned or leased by the farm in ques­tion.

⁵If the res­id­en­tial or in­dus­tri­al build­ings and their ad­join­ing land in ac­cord­ance with Art. 4 are not al­loc­ated to an ag­ri­cul­tur­al zone with­in five years, do­mest­ic waste wa­ter must be dis­charged in­to the pub­lic sew­ers.

¹Out­side areas covered by pub­lic sew­ers, waste wa­ter shall be dis­posed of by state-of-the art meth­ods.

²The can­tons shall en­sure that wa­ter qual­ity re­quire­ments are re­spec­ted.

¹All an­im­al hus­bandry farms must at­tempt to bal­ance their use of ma­nure.

²Farm ma­nure shall be used in ag­ri­cul­ture and hor­ti­cul­ture in an en­vir­on­ment­ally com­pat­ible way and ac­cord­ing to the state-of-the-art.

³The farm must have stor­age fa­cil­it­ies with a ca­pa­city for at least three months. However, the can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies may re­quire a high­er stor­age ca­pa­city for es­tab­lish­ments situ­ated in moun­tain areas or in areas with un­fa­vour­able cli­mat­ic or spe­cial crop grow­ing con­di­tions. Lower stor­age ca­pa­cit­ies may also be au­thor­ised for build­ings which are oc­cu­pied by live­stock for only short peri­ods of time.

⁴A max­im­um of three live­stock units of ma­nure may be spread on 1 ha of ag­ri­cul­tur­al land. If part of the farm ma­nure is used out­side the nor­mal loc­al farm­ing area, the num­ber of an­im­als kept must be such that at least half the ma­nure pro­duced by the farm may be used on the ag­ri­cul­tur­al land owned or leased.¹⁵

⁵Farms that provide ma­nure must re­cord each de­liv­ery in the in­form­a­tion sys­tem in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 165f of the Ag­ri­cul­ture Act of 29 April 1998¹⁶.¹⁷

⁶The can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies shall re­duce the num­ber of live­stock units of ma­nure per­mit­ted per hec­tare if the pol­lut­ant-bear­ing ca­pa­city of the soil, the alti­tude and to­po­graph­ic­al con­di­tions so re­quire.

⁷The Fed­er­al Coun­cil may au­thor­ise ex­cep­tions to the re­quire­ments for ag­ri­cul­tur­al land in cases of:

a.

poultry and horse-stabling farms, as well as oth­er already ex­ist­ing small or me­di­um-sized an­im­al hus­bandry farms;

b.

farms serving the pub­lic in­terest (waste re­cov­ery, re­search, etc.).

⁸One live­stock unit of ma­nure cor­res­ponds to the av­er­age an­nu­al pro­duc­tion of li­quid and sol­id ma­nure by one cow weigh­ing 600 kg.

¹The per­sons re­spons­ible for waste wa­ter treat­ment plants, stor­age fa­cil­it­ies and tech­nic­al pro­cessing plants for farm ma­nure and li­quid di­gest­ate as well as of raw fod­der silos shall en­sure that these are used, ser­viced and main­tained in an ap­pro­pri­ate man­ner.¹⁹ The cor­rect func­tion­ing of waste wa­ter treat­ment plants and pro­cessing plants for farm ma­nure must be checked at reg­u­lar in­ter­vals.

²The can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies shall en­sure that such in­stall­a­tions are in­spec­ted peri­od­ic­ally.

The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall lay down the re­quire­ments for:

a.

dis­charge in­to sew­ers;

b.

spe­cial re­leases from pro­duc­tion pro­cesses;

c.

residues from waste wa­ter treat­ment plants, their re­cov­ery and dis­pos­al;

d.

the in­spec­tion of in­stall­a­tions and equip­ment;

e.

the use of waste wa­ter is­su­ing from the pro­cessing of farm ma­nure.

Build­ing per­mits for new build­ings and build­ing al­ter­a­tions shall be gran­ted only if:

a.

in areas served by pub­lic sew­ers, pol­luted waste wa­ter is dis­charged in­to the sew­ers (Art. 11 para. 1) or used for ag­ri­cul­tur­al pur­poses (Art. 12 para. 4);

b.

out­side areas served by pub­lic sew­ers, the ap­pro­pri­ate dis­pos­al of pol­luted waste wa­ter is en­sured through spe­cial pro­ced­ures (Art. 13 para 1); the can­ton­al wa­ter pro­tec­tion agency shall be con­sul­ted to this ef­fect;

c.

there is a guar­an­tee that waste wa­ter which is un­suit­able for treat­ment by a cent­ral waste wa­ter treat­ment plant may be dis­posed of in an ap­pro­pri­ate man­ner (Art. 12 para. 2).

¹In the case of small build­ings and in­stall­a­tions in an area served by pub­lic sew­ers but which for over­rid­ing reas­ons can­not be im­me­di­ately con­nec­ted to such sew­ers, a build­ing per­mit may be gran­ted where it is pos­sible to provide the con­nec­tion in the short term and that in the mean­time the waste wa­ter may be dis­posed of in an­oth­er sat­is­fact­ory man­ner. Be­fore the au­thor­ity grants a build­ing per­mit in such cir­cum­stances, it shall con­sult with the can­ton­al wa­ter pro­tec­tion agency.

²The Fed­er­al Coun­cil may define the ex­cep­tions in great­er de­tail.

¹The can­tons shall di­vide their ter­rit­ory in­to wa­ter pro­tec­tion areas ac­cord­ing to the risks of pol­lu­tion to which sur­face and un­der­ground wa­ters are sub­ject. The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall en­act the re­quired reg­u­la­tions.

²In areas which are par­tic­u­larly vul­ner­able, the con­struc­tion and con­ver­sion of build­ings and in­stall­a­tions as well as op­er­a­tions such as ex­cav­a­tions, earth­works and sim­il­ar works may take place only provided that a can­ton­al per­mit has been gran­ted if they may pose a risk to the wa­ters.²⁰

¹The can­tons shall de­term­ine pro­tec­tion zones for ground­wa­ter wells and re­charge in­stall­a­tions serving the pub­lic in­terest; they shall lay down any lim­it­a­tions on prop­erty rights which may be re­quired to this ef­fect.

²The per­sons re­spons­ible for ground­wa­ter wells must:

a.

carry out the sur­veys ne­ces­sary to es­tab­lish the bound­ar­ies of pro­tec­tion zones;

b.

ac­quire the ne­ces­sary rights in rem;

c.

bear the cost, where ap­plic­able, of com­pens­a­tion paid in re­spect of lim­it­a­tions on prop­erty rights.

¹The can­tons shall de­term­ine areas which are of im­port­ance for the fu­ture use and re­charge of ground­wa­ter re­sources. In such areas, no build­ings or in­stall­a­tions may be con­struc­ted, and no works shall be car­ried out which might ad­versely af­fect any fu­ture in­stall­a­tion built to use or re­plen­ish the ground­wa­ter.

²The can­tons may trans­fer re­spons­ib­il­ity for pay­ing com­pens­a­tion in re­spect of lim­it­a­tions on prop­erty rights to per­sons sub­sequently re­spons­ible for ground­wa­ter wells and re­charge in­stall­a­tions.

¹ The per­sons re­spons­ible for in­stall­a­tions for hand­ling li­quids which may pol­lute wa­ter must en­sure that the struc­tures and equip­ment re­quired for the pro­tec­tion of the wa­ters are provided, reg­u­larly in­spec­ted and prop­erly op­er­ated and main­tained. Stor­age in­stall­a­tions that re­quire a per­mit (Art. 19 para. 2) must be in­spec­ted at least every ten years; de­pend­ing on the risk of pol­lu­tion to the wa­ters, the Fed­er­al Coun­cil may stip­u­late in­spec­tion in­ter­vals for oth­er in­stall­a­tions.

² Losses of li­quid must be pre­ven­ted at stor­age in­stall­a­tions and tran­ship­ment areas and leaks of li­quid shall be eas­ily de­tec­ted and re­tained.

³ In­stall­a­tions with li­quids which may pol­lute wa­ter may only be con­struc­ted, mod­i­fied, in­spec­ted, filled, main­tained, emp­tied and de­com­mis­sioned by per­sons who due to their train­ing, equip­ment and ex­per­i­ence guar­an­tee com­pli­ance with the state of the art.

⁴ Any per­son who man­u­fac­tures parts for in­stall­a­tions must test wheth­er these parts cor­res­pond to the state of the art and doc­u­ment the res­ults of the test.

⁵ If in­stall­a­tions with li­quids which may pol­lute wa­ter are con­struc­ted, mod­i­fied or de­com­mis­sioned, the per­sons re­spons­ible must re­port this to the can­ton in ac­cord­ance with can­ton­al reg­u­la­tions.

⁶ If the per­son re­spons­ible for an in­stall­a­tion with li­quids which may pol­lute wa­ter or any per­son en­trus­ted with the op­er­a­tion or main­ten­ance there­of de­tects a leak, they shall re­port this im­me­di­ately to the wa­ters pro­tec­tion in­spect­or­ate. They shall, on their own ini­ti­at­ive, take all reas­on­able meas­ures to pre­vent the re­lated pol­lu­tion of wa­ters.

⁷ Para­graphs 2–5 do not ap­ply to in­stall­a­tions that do not pose a risk of pol­lu­tion to wa­ters or only do so to a neg­li­gible ex­tent

Li­quids which may pol­lute wa­ter may not be stored in un­der­ground cav­erns if they come in­to con­tact with ground­wa­ter as a res­ult of such stor­age.

Art­icles 22 and 24 ap­ply by ana­logy to sub­stances which when mixed with li­quids may form li­quids which may pol­lute wa­ter.

¹Soils shall be used ac­cord­ing to the state of the art, in such a way that wa­ters are not ad­versely af­fected in any way, in par­tic­u­lar avoid­ing both wash­ing away and leach­ing of fer­til­isers and plant treat­ment products.

^1bis In the area of con­tri­bu­tion of drink­ing wa­ter wells, only plant pro­tec­tion products whose use does not lead to ground­wa­ter con­cen­tra­tions of act­ive sub­stances and de­grad­a­tion products ex­ceed­ing 0.1 µg/l may be used.²⁴

²The Fed­er­al Coun­cil may en­act the ne­ces­sary reg­u­la­tions.

If the meas­ures con­tained in Art­icles 7–27 prove in­suf­fi­cient to main­tain the wa­ter qual­ity re­quire­ments (Art. 9 para. 1) for a spe­cif­ic body of wa­ter, the can­tons shall en­sure that ad­di­tion­al meas­ures shall be ap­plied to the body of wa­ter it­self.

A per­mit is re­quired by any per­son who, over and above nor­mal pub­lic use:

a.

with­draws wa­ter from a wa­ter­course with per­man­ent flow;

b.

with­draws wa­ter from lakes or ground­wa­ter re­sources in such a way as to af­fect sub­stan­tially the dis­charge rate of a wa­ter­course with per­man­ent flow.

Such with­draw­al may be per­mit­ted provided that:

a.

the re­quire­ments con­tained in Art­icles 31–35 are com­plied with;

b.

taken to­geth­er with oth­er with­draw­als, the flow rate Q₃₄₇ is re­duced by at most 20 per cent and total with­draw­al amounts to not more than 1,000 litres per second; or

c.

for the sup­ply of drink­ing wa­ter, at most 80 litres per second from a spring and at most 100 litres per second from ground­wa­ter, based on the an­nu­al av­er­age, is with­drawn.

¹When with­draw­al takes place from a per­man­ently flow­ing wa­ter­course, the min­im­um re­sid­ual flow must be as fol­lows:

²The min­im­um re­sid­ual flow cal­cu­lated ac­cord­ing to para­graph 1 above shall be in­creased if the fol­low­ing re­quire­ments are not com­plied with and can­not be com­plied with as a res­ult of oth­er meas­ures:

a.

The pre­scribed wa­ter qual­ity of the sur­face wa­ters must be main­tained in spite of the wa­ter with­draw­al and ex­ist­ing waste wa­ter dis­charges.

b.

Ground­wa­ter re­sources must con­tin­ue to be re­plen­ished such that the drink­ing wa­ter sup­ply de­pend­ent on them re­mains avail­able to the re­quired ex­tent and the wa­ter bal­ance of soils used for ag­ri­cul­ture is not sub­stan­tially im­paired.

c.

Rare hab­it­ats and bio­coen­oses which de­pend dir­ectly or in­dir­ectly on the type and size of a body of wa­ter must either be main­tained or where pos­sible be re­placed by oth­ers of a sim­il­ar value un­less over­rid­ing reas­ons pre­vent this.

d.

The depth of wa­ter ne­ces­sary for free fish mi­gra­tion must be main­tained.

e.

In the case of wa­ter­courses with a flow rate Q₃₄₇ of up to 40 litres per second be­low an alti­tude of 800 metres above sea level which serve as spawn­ing grounds or hab­it­ats for ju­ven­ile fish, the con­tinu­ation of these func­tions must be guar­an­teed.

The can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies may lay down lower min­im­um re­sid­ual flow rates in the fol­low­ing cir­cum­stances:

a.²⁵

if the flow rate Q₃₄₇ of the body of wa­ter is lower than 50 l/s: over a 1,000 m long stretch be­low a point of with­draw­al from a body of wa­ter situ­ated at an alti­tude high­er than 1,700 m above sea level or from a body of wa­ter not suit­able as a hab­it­at for fish and situ­ated at an alti­tude between 1,500 and 1,700 m above sea level;

b.

in the case of wa­ter with­draw­als from bod­ies of wa­ter not suit­able as hab­it­ats for fish provided that the re­sid­ual rate of flow rep­res­ents at least 35 per cent of the flow rate Q₃₄₇;

b^bis.²⁶

on a 1000 m long stretch be­low a place of with­draw­al in sec­tions with neg­li­gible eco­lo­gic­al po­ten­tial, provided the nat­ur­al func­tions of the body of wa­ter are not sub­stan­tially im­paired;

c.

in the frame­work of a pro­tec­tion and util­isa­tion plan­ning for a lim­ited area form­ing a to­po­graph­ic­al whole, in so far as an ap­pro­pri­ate bal­ance can be achieved in the same area by spe­cif­ic meas­ures such as re­frain­ing from fur­ther with­draw­als; such pro­tec­tion and util­isa­tion plan shall re­quire the ap­prov­al of the Fed­er­al Coun­cil;

d.

in cases of ne­ces­sity, for with­draw­als lim­ited in time, in par­tic­u­lar for the sup­ply of drink­ing wa­ter, for fire-fight­ing or for ag­ri­cul­tur­al ir­rig­a­tion.

¹The au­thor­it­ies shall in­crease the min­im­um re­sid­ual flow to the ex­tent which is deemed ne­ces­sary after weigh­ing up the in­terests for and against the planned wa­ter with­draw­al.

²In­terests in fa­vour of a wa­ter with­draw­al are as fol­lows:

a.

pub­lic in­terests which may be served by the wa­ter with­draw­al;

b.

eco­nom­ic in­terests of the area in which the wa­ter ori­gin­ates;

c.

eco­nom­ic in­terests of those wish­ing to with­draw the wa­ter;

d.

en­ergy sup­ply which may be served by the wa­ter with­draw­al.

³In­terests against a wa­ter with­draw­al are as fol­lows:

a.

the sig­ni­fic­ance of the wa­ters as an ele­ment of the land­scape;

b.

the sig­ni­fic­ance of the wa­ters as a nat­ur­al hab­it­at and for the con­ser­va­tion of the di­versity of the de­pend­ent fauna and flora, in par­tic­u­lar of the fish fauna, the in­come de­rived from fish­ing and the nat­ur­al re­pro­duc­tion of fish;

c.

main­tain­ing a rate of flow suf­fi­cient to sat­is­fy the qual­ity re­quire­ments of wa­ters in the long run;

d.

main­tain­ing a bal­anced ground­wa­ter re­gi­men which guar­an­tees fu­ture sup­plies of drink­ing wa­ter, land use cus­tom­ary to the area and ve­get­a­tion suited to the loc­a­tion;

e.

en­sur­ing ag­ri­cul­tur­al ir­rig­a­tion.

⁴Any­one wish­ing to with­draw wa­ter shall provide the au­thor­it­ies with a re­port on:

a.

the con­sequences of the wa­ter with­draw­al, cal­cu­lated at vari­ous rates of flow, on the in­terests served by the with­draw­al, with par­tic­u­lar re­gard to the pro­duc­tion of elec­tric en­ergy and its costs;

b.

the in­terests which are likely to be ad­versely af­fected by the wa­ter with­draw­al and meas­ures which might be taken to pre­vent such impair­ment.

If wa­ter is with­drawn from lakes or ground­wa­ter re­sources and the rate of flow of wa­ter­courses is thereby sub­stan­tially af­fected, the wa­ter­courses in ques­tion must be pro­tec­ted as provided for in Art­icles 31–33.

¹The au­thor­it­ies shall de­cide in each in­di­vidu­al case on the re­quired wa­ter en­dow­ment and any oth­er meas­ures which may be ne­ces­sary to pro­tect wa­ters be­low the point of with­draw­al.

²They may spe­cify tem­por­ally vari­able re­quired wa­ter en­dow­ments. Re­sid­ual flows shall not fall be­low those spe­cified in Art­icles 31 and 32.

³The au­thor­it­ies shall con­sult the com­pet­ent agen­cies be­fore mak­ing their de­cision; in cases where the with­draw­als in ques­tion con­cern hy­dro­power plants with gross pro­duc­tion in ex­cess of 300 kW, they shall also con­sult the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment.

¹Any­one with­draw­ing wa­ter from any body of wa­ter shall be re­quired to prove to the au­thor­it­ies by means of meas­ure­ments that he will main­tain the re­quired wa­ter en­dow­ment. If the cost of such a pro­ced­ure is un­reas­on­able, evid­ence may be provided by a cal­cu­la­tion based on the wa­ter bal­ance.

²If he proves that the ef­fect­ive rate of flow is tem­por­ar­ily lower than the re­quired wa­ter en­dow­ment, he is only ob­liged to main­tain a re­quired wa­ter en­dow­ment equal of the ef­fect­ive rate of flow dur­ing the peri­od in which such a situ­ation ex­ists.

¹ The can­tons, after hear­ing the parties con­cerned, shall stip­u­late the spa­tial re­quire­ments for sur­face wa­ters (space provided for wa­ters) in or­der to guar­an­tee the fol­low­ing func­tions:

a.

the nat­ur­al func­tions of the wa­ters;

b.

flood pro­tec­tion;

c.

the use of the wa­ters.

² The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall reg­u­late the de­tails.

³ The can­tons shall en­sure that that space provided for wa­ters is taken in­to ac­count in struc­ture and land use plan­ning and that it is de­veloped and ex­ploited ex­tens­ively. The space provided for wa­ters does not con­sti­tute ar­able land. In the event of a loss of ar­able land, this must be com­pensated for as spe­cified in the fed­er­al sec­tor­al plan in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 13 of the Spa­tial Plan­ning Act of 22 June 1979²⁹.

¹Wa­ter­courses may be chan­nelled or straightened only provided that:

a.³⁰

the pro­tec­tion of per­sons or sub­stan­tial ma­ter­i­al val­ues re­quires it (Art. 3 para. 2, of the Fed­er­al Act of 21 June 1991³¹ on Hy­draul­ic En­gin­eer­ing);

b.

it is ne­ces­sary for the pro­vi­sion of nav­ig­able pas­sage or for the use of hy­dro­power in the pub­lic in­terest;

b^bis.³²

it is ne­ces­sary for the con­struc­tion of a land­fill that can only be con­struc­ted at the planned loc­a­tion and in which only un­pol­luted ex­cav­a­tion ma­ter­i­al, quar­ried ma­ter­i­al or spoil is de­pos­ited;

c.

the con­di­tion of an already chan­nelled or straightened wa­ter­course may be im­proved in terms of this Act.

²The nat­ur­al course of the body of wa­ter must wherever pos­sible be pre­served or re­stored. Wa­ters and the space provided for wa­ters must be de­veloped in such a man­ner that:³³

a.

they provide hab­it­at for di­ver­si­fied fauna and flora;

b.

the in­ter­ac­tions between sur­face and un­der­ground wa­ters are main­tained to the greatest ex­tent pos­sible;

c.

ve­get­a­tion suited to the loc­a­tion may grow on the banks.

³In built-up areas, the au­thor­it­ies may per­mit ex­cep­tions to para­graph 2.

⁴Para­graph 2 also ap­plies by ana­logy to the cre­ation of ar­ti­fi­cial wa­ter­courses.

¹Wa­ter­courses may not be covered or cul­ver­ted.

²The au­thor­it­ies may per­mit ex­cep­tions for:

a.

flood over­flow and ir­rig­a­tion chan­nels;

b.

pas­sages un­der traffic ways;

c.

pas­sages un­der ag­ri­cul­tur­al or forestry trans­port routes;

d.

small drain­age chan­nels with in­ter­mit­tent flow;

e.

the re­place­ment of ex­ist­ing un­der­ground pas­sages or cov­er­ings, in­so­far as an open wa­ter­course is not pos­sible or would put sub­stan­tial dis­ad­vant­ages in the way of ag­ri­cul­tur­al util­isa­tion.

¹ The can­tons shall en­sure that wa­ters are re­hab­il­it­ated. In do­ing so, they take ac­count of the be­ne­fits to nature and the land­scape as well as the eco­nom­ic con­sequences of the re­hab­il­it­a­tion.

² They shall plan the re­hab­il­it­a­tion meas­ures and spe­cify the time sched­ule there­for. They shall en­sure that these plans are taken in­to ac­count in the struc­ture and land use plan­ning. In the event of a loss of ar­able land, this must be com­pensated for as spe­cified in the fed­er­al sec­tor­al plan in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 13 of the Spa­tial Plan­ning Act of 22 June 1979³⁵.

¹The in­tro­duc­tion of sol­id sub­stances in­to lakes is pro­hib­ited even in cases where these sub­stances would not lead to pol­lu­tion.

²The can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies may per­mit the cre­ation of em­bank­ments:

a.

for the con­struc­tion of build­ings in built-up areas which can­not be loc­ated else­where if an over­rid­ing pub­lic in­terest re­quires such an em­bank­ment and the pur­pose in view can­not be at­tained in any oth­er way;

b.

if a shal­low wa­ter zone may be thereby im­proved.

³The em­bank­ments cre­ated shall be as nat­ur­al as pos­sible, and all bank flora des­troyed shall be re­placed.

¹ Those re­spons­ible for hy­dro­power plants must pre­vent or elim­in­ate by means of civil en­gin­eer­ing meas­ures short-term ar­ti­fi­cial changes in the wa­ter flow on a body of wa­ter (hy­dropeak­ing) that cause ser­i­ous harm to the in­di­gen­ous flora and fauna as well as their hab­it­ats. At the re­quest of the per­son re­spons­ible for a hy­dro­power plant, the au­thor­ity may or­der op­er­a­tion­al in­stead of civil en­gin­eer­ing meas­ures.

² The meas­ures are de­term­ined by:

a.

the de­gree of harm caused to the body of wa­ter;

b.

the eco­lo­gic­al po­ten­tial of the body of wa­ter;

c.

the pro­por­tion­al­ity of the cost;

d.

the in­terests of flood pro­tec­tion;

e.

the en­ergy policy goals re­lat­ing to the pro­mo­tion of re­new­able en­ergy sources.

³ With­in the catch­ment area of the body of wa­ter con­cerned, the meas­ures must be co­ordin­ated with each oth­er after hear­ing the per­sons re­spons­ible for the hy­dro­power plants con­cerned.

⁴ Re­ten­tion basins con­struc­ted in ap­plic­a­tion of para­graph 1 may be used for pumped stor­age without modi­fic­a­tion of the li­cence.

¹The per­son re­spons­ible for a dam shall as far as pos­sible en­sure that in flush­ing or empty­ing an im­pound­ment or when in­spect­ing drain­age and flood over­flow struc­tures, down­stream fauna and flora are not harmed.

²Flush­ing and empty­ing shall take place only with the au­thor­isa­tion of the can­ton­al au­thor­ity. The li­cens­ing au­thor­ity shall con­sult in­ter­ested spe­cial­ist agen­cies. If peri­od­ic­al flush­ing and empty­ing are re­quired in or­der to main­tain op­er­a­tion­al safety, the au­thor­ity shall fix only the times and types of such op­er­a­tions.

³If a per­son re­spons­ible is ob­liged to lower the wa­ter level of a reser­voir on safety grounds as a res­ult of ex­cep­tion­al events, he shall im­me­di­ately in­form the re­spons­ible au­thor­ity.

¹Any­one who dams up a wa­ter­course may not put any flot­sam which he may have re­moved for op­er­a­tion­al reas­ons back in­to the wa­ter. The au­thor­ity may grant ex­cep­tions.

²The per­son re­spons­ible for a dam must peri­od­ic­ally col­lect the flot­sam near his in­stall­a­tion ac­cord­ing to the in­struc­tions of the au­thor­ity.

¹If wa­ter is with­drawn from or dis­charged in­to a nat­ur­al lake, the strat­i­fic­a­tion and flow con­di­tions in the lake may not be sub­stan­tially mod­i­fied, and no wa­ter-level fluc­tu­ations po­ten­tially harm­ful to the ri­pari­an zone may be al­lowed to oc­cur.

²In the case of wa­ter­courses, the type and loc­a­tion of the dis­charge of fresh wa­ter or waste wa­ter must be se­lec­ted in such a way that as little ar­ti­fi­cial re­in­force­ment and cor­rec­tion as pos­sible is re­quired.

¹The can­tons shall en­sure that over the long term no more wa­ter is with­drawn from ground­wa­ter re­sources than flows in­to them. In the short term, more wa­ter may be with­drawn un­less this im­pairs the qual­ity of ground­wa­ter or the ve­get­a­tion.

²If a ground­wa­ter re­source is im­paired as a res­ult of ex­cess­ive with­draw­al or through re­duced re­charge, the can­ton shall en­sure that the situ­ation is remedied as far as pos­sible, either through re­du­cing the rate of with­draw­al or by ar­ti­fi­cial re­charge or by un­der­ground stor­age of drink­ing wa­ter.

³Dif­fer­ent ground­wa­ter re­sources may not be con­nec­ted to each oth­er on a per­man­ent basis if such a con­nec­tion may im­pair the quant­ity or qual­ity of the ground­wa­ter.

⁴Stor­age volumes and flows of us­able ground­wa­ter re­sources may not be sub­stan­tially re­duced on a per­man­ent basis as a res­ult of new in­stall­a­tions of any kind.

⁵Low dams shall not sub­stan­tially im­pair the ground­wa­ter nor the ve­get­a­tion which de­pends on the ground­wa­ter level. The au­thor­ity may grant ex­cep­tions for ex­ist­ing in­stall­a­tions.

⁶Drain­age of a zone which res­ults in a lower­ing of the ground­wa­ter table over a large area shall be per­mit­ted only if ag­ri­cul­tur­al util­isa­tion can­not be en­sured in any oth­er way.

¹ The bed load budget in the body of wa­ter may not be changed by in­stall­a­tions to the ex­tent that they cause ser­i­ous harm to the in­di­gen­ous flora and fauna, their hab­it­ats, the ground­wa­ter re­gi­men and flood pro­tec­tion. The per­sons re­spons­ible for the in­stall­a­tions shall take suit­able meas­ures to this end.

² The meas­ures are de­term­ined by:

a.

the de­gree of harm caused to the body of wa­ter;

b.

the eco­lo­gic­al po­ten­tial of the body of wa­ter;

c.

the pro­por­tion­al­ity of the cost;

d.

the in­terests of flood pro­tec­tion;

e.

the en­ergy policy goals re­lat­ing to the pro­mo­tion of re­new­able en­ergy sources.

³ With­in the catch­ment area of the body of wa­ter con­cerned, the meas­ures must be co­ordin­ated with each oth­er after hear­ing the per­sons re­spons­ible for the in­stall­a­tions con­cerned.

¹ Any­one wish­ing to ex­tract gravel, sand or oth­er ma­ter­i­als or to carry out pre­par­at­ory ex­cav­a­tions for such ex­trac­tion re­quires a per­mit.

² Per­mits for such work may not be gran­ted:

a.

in ground­wa­ter pro­tec­tion zones;

b.

be­low the ground­wa­ter table of ground­wa­ter re­sources whose amount and qual­ity are suit­able for wa­ter sup­ply;

c.

for wa­ter­courses where the bed load budget may be neg­at­ively af­fected.

³For ground­wa­ter re­sources whose amount and qual­ity are suit­able for wa­ter sup­ply, ex­trac­tion may be per­mit­ted above ground­wa­ter level, provided a pro­tect­ive lay­er of ma­ter­i­al is left above the max­im­um ground­wa­ter table pos­sible. The di­men­sion of this pro­tect­ive lay­er shall be chosen ac­cord­ing to the loc­al con­di­tions.

The can­tons shall en­force this Act in all cases where Art­icle 48 does not re­quire en­force­ment by the Con­fed­er­a­tion. They shall en­act all ne­ces­sary reg­u­la­tions.

¹The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall over­see the en­force­ment of this Act.

²The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall reg­u­late co-or­din­a­tion:

a.

of the wa­ter pro­tec­tion meas­ures of the can­tons;

b.

between fed­er­al agen­cies;

c.

between fed­er­al agen­cies and the can­tons.

¹The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall en­act the im­ple­ment­ing reg­u­la­tions.

² …³⁹

¹ In en­for­cing any oth­er fed­er­al act or any in­ter­na­tion­al agree­ment, the rel­ev­ant fed­er­al au­thor­ity is at the same time re­spons­ible for the en­force­ment of the Wa­ters Pro­tec­tion Act. Be­fore mak­ing its de­cision, it shall con­sult the can­tons con­cerned. The Fed­er­al Of­fice for the En­vir­on­ment⁴¹ (Fed­er­al Of­fice)⁴² and the oth­er fed­er­al agen­cies con­cerned shall par­ti­cip­ate in the en­force­ment pro­ced­ures in ac­cord­ance with Art­icles 62a and 62b of the Gov­ern­ment and Ad­min­is­tra­tion Or­gan­isa­tion Act of 21 March 1997⁴³.

² If the pro­ced­ure un­der para­graph 1 is not suit­able for cer­tain tasks, the Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall reg­u­late en­force­ment by the fed­er­al agen­cies con­cerned.

³ The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall en­force the reg­u­la­tions on sub­stances (Art. 9 para. 2 let. c); it may call on the as­sist­ance of the can­tons for spe­cif­ic ele­ments of its tasks.

⁴ The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall de­cide which in­form­a­tion ob­tained in ac­cord­ance with oth­er fed­er­al acts on sub­stances will be made avail­able to the Fed­er­al Of­fice.

¹The can­tons shall set up wa­ters pro­tec­tion agen­cies. They shall or­gan­ise the wa­ters pro­tec­tion in­spect­or­ate and an emer­gency ser­vice.

²The Fed­er­al Of­fice is the wa­ters pro­tec­tion agency for the Con­fed­er­a­tion.

³The Con­fed­er­a­tion and the can­tons may del­eg­ate en­force­ment du­ties, in par­tic­u­lar with re­gard to in­spec­tion and su­per­vi­sion, to pub­lic cor­por­a­tions or private in­di­vidu­als.

¹The Con­fed­er­a­tion and the can­tons shall ex­am­ine the ef­fects of the meas­ures taken un­der this Act and shall keep the pub­lic in­formed about wa­ters pro­tec­tion and the con­di­tion of wa­ters; in par­tic­u­lar:

a.

they shall pub­lish stud­ies on the suc­cess of meas­ures un­der this Act;

b.

they may, provided it is of gen­er­al in­terest and hav­ing con­sul­ted those con­cerned, pub­lish the res­ults of stud­ies and in­spec­tions re­lat­ing to private and pub­lic wa­ters (Art. 52).

² Over­rid­ing private and pub­lic in­terests in con­fid­en­ti­al­ity and man­u­fac­tur­ing and busi­ness secrecy are re­served in every case.

³ The wa­ters pro­tec­tion agen­cies shall provide ad­vice to the au­thor­it­ies and to private in­di­vidu­als. The agen­cies shall re­com­mend meas­ures for the pre­ven­tion or re­duc­tion of det­ri­ment­al ef­fects on wa­ters.

The can­tons shall en­sure that an ad­vis­ory ser­vice be set up for the en­force­ment of Art­icles 14 and 27.

¹The fed­er­al and can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies may carry out sur­veys on private and pub­lic bod­ies of wa­ter. They may set up the equip­ment ne­ces­sary for this pur­pose, and they may in­spect in­stall­a­tions. Own­ers of land and per­sons re­spons­ible for in­stall­a­tions shall en­sure that per­sons en­trus­ted with such du­ties are al­lowed ac­cess, and they shall provide them with all the in­form­a­tion that they may re­quire.

²Per­sons en­trus­ted with en­for­cing this Act, as well as ex­perts and mem­bers of com­mis­sions and spe­cial­ised bod­ies, shall be sub­ject to the rules of pro­fes­sion­al secrecy.

³ …⁴⁵

The au­thor­it­ies may im­ple­ment the meas­ures en­acted by them by means of en­force­ment or­ders. In­so­far as can­ton­al law either con­tains no reg­u­la­tions or does not con­tain stricter reg­u­la­tions, Art­icle 41 of the Ad­min­is­trat­ive Pro­ced­ure Act of 20 Decem­ber 1968⁴⁶ ap­plies to can­ton­al pro­ced­ures.

The costs of meas­ures taken by the au­thor­it­ies to pre­vent any im­me­di­ate threat to wa­ters, as well as to as­cer­tain and re­pair dam­age, shall be borne by the per­sons re­spons­ible for these meas­ures.

¹The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall levy charges for its per­mits and in­spec­tions, as well as for any spe­cial ser­vices provided un­der this Act.

²The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall de­term­ine the rates for such charges.

¹If a sur­face or un­der­ground body of wa­ter cov­ers ter­rit­ory from more than one can­ton, each of the can­tons con­cerned shall take all ne­ces­sary meas­ures to pro­tect that body of wa­ter and in the in­terests of the oth­er can­tons.

²If the can­tons in ques­tion can­not agree on the meas­ures to be taken, the Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall de­cide.

¹The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall carry out sur­veys with rel­ev­ance to Switzer­land as a whole in­to:

a.

the hy­dro­lo­gic­al bal­ance;

b.

the wa­ter qual­ity of sur­face and un­der­ground wa­ters;

c.

the sup­ply of drink­ing wa­ter;

d.

oth­er mat­ters con­cern­ing the pro­tec­tion of wa­ters.

²It may par­ti­cip­ate fin­an­cially in the de­vel­op­ment of in­stall­a­tions and pro­ced­ures to in­crease the state of tech­nic­al know­ledge in the gen­er­al in­terest of wa­ters pro­tec­tion, with par­tic­u­lar re­spect to meas­ures taken at the source.

³It shall make the res­ults and in­ter­pret­a­tion of sur­veys avail­able to in­ter­ested parties.

⁴The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall reg­u­late the im­ple­ment­a­tion of sur­veys and their eval­u­ation.

⁵Fed­er­al agen­cies shall is­sue spe­cial­ised tech­nic­al in­struc­tions and shall provide ad­vice to mon­it­or­ing agen­cies. They may carry out hy­dro­lo­gic­al work against pay­ment for third parties or make their equip­ment avail­able for such work.

¹The can­tons shall carry out any fur­ther sur­veys which may be ne­ces­sary for the en­force­ment of this Act. They shall com­mu­nic­ate the res­ults of such sur­veys to the fed­er­al agen­cies con­cerned.

²The can­tons shall es­tab­lish an in­vent­ory of wa­ter sup­ply in­stall­a­tions and ground­wa­ter re­sources on their ter­rit­ory. The in­vent­ory shall be avail­able to the pub­lic un­less the in­terests of na­tion­al de­fence re­quire secrecy.

In cases where data for any body of wa­ter are in­suf­fi­cient, the flow rate Q₃₄₇ shall be eval­u­ated by oth­er meth­ods, such as hy­dro­lo­gic­al ob­ser­va­tions or math­em­at­ic­al mod­els.

Be­fore an au­thor­ity is­sues a per­mit for an op­er­a­tion which may have an ef­fect on a body of wa­ter in the vi­cin­ity of a hy­dro­lo­gic­al or oth­er mon­it­or­ing sta­tion, it shall no­ti­fy the agency re­spons­ible for the sta­tion.

¹ The can­tons shall en­sure that the costs of the con­struc­tion, op­er­a­tion, main­ten­ance, im­prove­ment and re­place­ment of waste wa­ter treat­ment plants that serve the pub­lic in­terest are passed on to the per­sons re­spons­ible for the pro­duc­tion of the waste wa­ter through fees or oth­er charges. In or­gan­ising the charges, the fol­low­ing factors in par­tic­u­lar shall be taken in­to ac­count:

a.

the nature and volume of the waste wa­ter pro­duced;

b.

the de­pre­ci­ation re­quired to pre­serve the value of the in­stall­a­tions;

c.

the in­terest;

d.

the planned in­vest­ment re­quire­ments for main­ten­ance, im­prove­ments and re­place­ments, for ad­apt­a­tion to stat­utory re­quire­ments and for op­er­a­tion­al op­tim­isa­tion.

² If im­pos­ing cost-cov­er­ing charges that com­ply with the pol­luter pays prin­ciple jeop­ard­ises the en­vir­on­ment­ally com­pat­ible dis­pos­al of waste wa­ter, dis­pos­al may be fin­anced dif­fer­ently to the ex­tent re­quired.

³ The per­sons re­spons­ible for the waste wa­ter treat­ment plants must form the re­quired fin­an­cial re­serves.

⁴ The prin­ciples for cal­cu­lat­ing the charges shall be made pub­lic.

¹ The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall col­lect from the per­sons re­spons­ible for cent­ral waste wa­ter treat­ment plants a charge to fin­ance the pay­ment for meas­ures to re­move or­gan­ic trace sub­stances in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 61a, in­clud­ing the Con­fed­er­a­tion’s im­ple­ment­a­tion costs.

² Per­sons re­spons­ible for cent­ral waste wa­ter treat­ment plants who have taken meas­ures un­der Art­icle 61a and sub­mit­ted the re­lated fi­nal ac­count for the in­vest­ment made by 30 Septem­ber in any cal­en­dar year are ex­emp­ted from pay­ing the charge from the fol­low­ing cal­en­dar year on­wards.

³ The level of the charge is based on the num­ber of res­id­ents con­nec­ted to the waste wa­ter treat­ment plant. The an­nu­al charge rate amounts to a max­im­um of 9 francs per res­id­ent.

⁴ The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall de­term­ine the charge rate based on the an­ti­cip­ated costs and reg­u­late the pro­ced­ure for col­lect­ing the charge. The charge shall cease to ap­ply by 31 Decem­ber 2040 at the latest.

⁵ The per­sons re­spons­ible for the plants shall pass on the charge to the per­sons re­spons­ible for pro­du­cing the waste wa­ter.

¹ With­in the lim­its of the ap­proved cred­its and on the basis of pro­gramme agree­ments, the Con­fed­er­a­tion shall grant the can­tons glob­al com­pens­at­ory pay­ments for the con­struc­tion and pro­cure­ment of:

a.

in­stall­a­tions and equip­ment for ni­tro­gen re­mov­al at cent­ral waste wa­ter treat­ment plants provided they serve to ful­fil agree­ments un­der in­ter­na­tion­al law or de­cisions of in­ter­na­tion­al or­gan­isa­tions that have the aim of main­tain­ing the qual­ity of wa­ters out­side Switzer­land;

b.

sew­ers that are con­struc­ted in­stead of in­stall­a­tions and equip­ment in ac­cord­ance with let­ter a.

² The level of the com­pens­at­ory pay­ments is de­term­ined by the volume of ni­tro­gen that is re­moved by means of the meas­ures men­tioned in para­graph 1.

¹ With­in the lim­its of the ap­proved cred­its and the avail­able re­sources, the Con­fed­er­a­tion shall grant the can­tons glob­al com­pens­at­ory pay­ments for the con­struc­tion and pro­cure­ment of:

a.

in­stall­a­tions and equip­ment for re­mov­ing or­gan­ic trace sub­stances at cent­ral waste wa­ter treat­ment plants where they are re­quired to com­ply with the reg­u­la­tions on dis­char­ging waste wa­ter in­to bod­ies of wa­ter;

b.

sew­ers that are con­struc­ted in­stead of in­stall­a­tions and equip­ment in ac­cord­ance with let­ter a.

² The com­pens­at­ory pay­ments are made if the con­struc­tion or pro­cure­ment of the in­stall­a­tions, equip­ment or sew­ers was be­gun after 1 Janu­ary 2012 and with­in 20 years of the entry in­to force of the amend­ment to this Act of 21 March 2014.

³ The pay­ments amount to 75 per cent of the at­trib­ut­able costs.

¹ With­in the lim­its of the ap­proved cred­its, the Con­fed­er­a­tion shall grant the can­tons com­pens­at­ory pay­ments for the con­struc­tion and pro­cure­ment of in­stall­a­tions and equip­ment for the dis­pos­al of spe­cial waste, provided such in­stall­a­tions and equip­ment are of be­ne­fit to Switzer­land as a whole.

² With­in the lim­its of the ap­proved cred­its, the Con­fed­er­a­tion shall grant the can­tons with low or me­di­um fin­an­cial ca­pa­city com­pens­at­ory pay­ments for the con­struc­tion and pro­cure­ment of in­stall­a­tions and equip­ment for the treat­ment or re­cov­ery of mu­ni­cip­al waste provided the first in­stance de­cision on the con­struc­tion of the in­stall­a­tion was taken be­fore 1 Novem­ber 1997. The Fed­er­al Coun­cil may ex­tend this dead­line for re­gions that do not have the re­quired ca­pa­cit­ies to 31 Oc­to­ber 1999 at the latest if the cir­cum­stances so re­quire.

^2bis The right to fed­er­al con­tri­bu­tions in ac­cord­ance with para­graph 2 con­tin­ues if:

a.

the first in­stance de­cision on the con­struc­tion of an in­stall­a­tion was taken be­fore the ex­ten­ded dead­line;

b.

for tech­nic­al reas­ons not due to fault on the part of the can­ton a new in­stall­a­tion must be ap­proved;

c.

the new first in­stance de­cision is taken be­fore 1 Novem­ber 2005; and

d.

con­struc­tion is be­gun be­fore 1 Novem­ber 2006.⁵⁵

³ …⁵⁶

⁴ The com­pens­at­ory pay­ments shall amount to:

a.

25 per cent of the at­trib­ut­able costs for in­stall­a­tions and equip­ment in ac­cord­ance with para­graphs 1 and 2;

b.⁵⁷

…

¹ With­in the lim­its of the ap­proved cred­its, the Con­fed­er­a­tion shall grant com­pens­at­ory pay­ments for meas­ures in ag­ri­cul­ture to pre­vent wash­ing away or leach­ing of sub­stances if:

a.

the meas­ures are ne­ces­sary to ful­fil the re­quire­ments re­lat­ing to wa­ter qual­ity of sur­face and un­der­ground wa­ters;

b.

the can­ton con­cerned has des­ig­nated the areas in which the meas­ures are re­quired and co­ordin­ated the meas­ures re­quired;

c.

the meas­ures are not eco­nom­ic­ally vi­able.

² The level of the com­pens­at­ory pay­ments is de­term­ined by the nature and volume of the sub­stances that are to be pre­ven­ted from wash­ing away or leach­ing, and by the costs of the meas­ures that are not covered by con­tri­bu­tions un­der the Ag­ri­cul­ture Act of 29 April 1998⁵⁹ or the Fed­er­al Act of 1 Ju­ly 1966⁶⁰ on Nature and Cul­tur­al Her­it­age.⁶¹

³ …⁶²

⁴ The Fed­er­al Of­fice for Ag­ri­cul­ture shall grant the com­pens­at­ory pay­ments as glob­al con­tri­bu­tions on the basis of pro­gramme agree­ments entered in­to with the can­tons for each area in which the meas­ures are re­quired. In or­der to as­sess wheth­er the pro­grammes guar­an­tee the re­quired pro­tec­tion of wa­ters, it shall con­sult the Fed­er­al Of­fice for the En­vir­on­ment. The can­tons shall al­loc­ate the com­pens­at­ory pay­ments to the in­di­vidu­als en­titled.⁶³

¹ The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall, with­in the lim­its of the ap­proved cred­its and on the basis of pro­gramme agree­ments, grant the can­tons com­pens­at­ory pay­ments in the form of glob­al con­tri­bu­tions to the plan­ning and im­ple­ment­a­tion of meas­ures for the re­hab­il­it­a­tion of wa­ters.

² In the case of es­pe­cially com­plex pro­jects, the can­tons may be gran­ted the com­pens­at­ory pay­ments on a case-by-case basis.

³ The level of the com­pens­at­ory pay­ments is de­term­ined by the rel­ev­ance of the meas­ures for the re-es­tab­lish­ment of the nat­ur­al func­tions of the wa­ters as well as by the ef­fect­ive­ness of the meas­ures.

⁴ No con­tri­bu­tions shall be gran­ted for the dis­mant­ling of an in­stall­a­tion if the per­son re­spons­ible for it is ob­liged to dis­mantle it.

⁵ The man­agers of the space provided for wa­ters shall be gran­ted com­pens­at­ory pay­ments in ac­cord­ance with the Ag­ri­cul­ture Act of 29 April 1998⁶⁵ for the ex­tens­ive use of their lands. The ag­ri­cul­ture budget as well as the re­lated spend­ing ceil­ings shall be in­creased for this pur­pose.

¹ The Con­fed­er­a­tion shall with­in the lim­its of the ap­proved cred­its grant the can­tons com­pens­at­ory pay­ments for plan­ning in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 83b, provided the plans are sub­mit­ted to the Con­fed­er­a­tion by 31 Decem­ber 2014.

² The com­pens­at­ory pay­ments shall amount to 35 per cent of the at­trib­ut­able costs.

Com­pens­at­ory pay­ments shall be gran­ted only if the in­ten­ded solu­tion is based on ap­pro­pri­ate plans, guar­an­tees ap­pro­pri­ate pro­tec­tion of the wa­ters, cor­res­ponds to the state of the art and is eco­nom­ic­ally feas­ible.

¹ With­in the lim­its of the ap­proved cred­its, the Con­fed­er­a­tion may grant the can­tons com­pens­at­ory pay­ments for as­cer­tain­ing the causes of in­ad­equate wa­ter qual­ity in an im­port­ant body of wa­ter with a view to re­medi­al meas­ures.⁶⁸

² It may provide fin­an­cial as­sist­ance for the ba­sic and con­tinu­ing edu­ca­tion and train­ing of spe­cial­ists and for the pro­vi­sion of in­form­a­tion to the pub­lic.⁶⁹

³ With­in the lim­its of the ap­proved cred­its, it may provide sup­port for the pre­par­a­tion of can­ton­al in­vent­or­ies of wa­ter sup­ply in­stall­a­tions and ground­wa­ter re­sources by means of com­pens­at­ory pay­ments or through its own work provided:

a.

the in­vent­or­ies are pre­pared ac­cord­ing to fed­er­al guidelines; and

b.

the ap­plic­a­tions are sub­mit­ted be­fore 1 Novem­ber 2010.⁷⁰

⁴ The fed­er­al pay­ments shall not ex­ceed 40 per cent of the costs.⁷¹

The Con­fed­er­a­tion may provide a risk guar­an­tee in re­spect of prom­ising new in­stall­a­tions and equip­ment. This may not ex­ceed 60 per cent of the at­trib­ut­able costs.

¹ The Fed­er­al As­sembly shall ap­prove by a simple fed­er­al de­cree a tem­por­ary guar­an­tee cred­it⁷⁴ to en­sure the pay­ment of con­tri­bu­tions.⁷⁵

² It shall ap­prove by simple fed­er­al de­cree for suc­cess­ive four year peri­ods the re­sources for the pay­ment of com­pens­at­ory pay­ments that have been guar­an­teed in prin­ciple in ap­plic­a­tion of Art­icle 13 para­graph 6 of the Sub­sidies Act of 5 Oc­to­ber 1990⁷⁶.

³ It shall ap­prove by means of a multi-year guar­an­tee cred­it the max­im­um amount for risk guar­an­tee provided by the Con­fed­er­a­tion un­der Art­icle 64a.

¹ Fed­er­al pay­ments made in er­ror shall be re­claimed. This also ap­plies if an in­stall­a­tion or piece of equip­ment is used for a pur­pose oth­er than that in­ten­ded.

²The Con­fed­er­a­tion’s right to bring claims pre­scribes three years after the date on which it learned of its claim and in any event ten years after the date on which the right first arose.⁷⁷

³ If the re­cip­i­ent has com­mit­ted a crim­in­al of­fence through his or her con­duct, the right to a re­fund pre­scribes at the earli­est when the right to pro­sec­ute the of­fence pre­scribes. If the right to pro­sec­ute is no longer li­able to pre­scrip­tion be­cause a first in­stance crim­in­al judg­ment has been is­sued, the right pre­scribes at the earli­est three years after no­tice of the judg­ment is giv­en.⁷⁸

The ap­peal pro­ced­ure is gov­erned by the gen­er­al pro­vi­sions on the ad­min­is­tra­tion of fed­er­al justice.

¹ The Fed­er­al Of­fice is en­titled to make use of the rights of leg­al re­course avail­able un­der fed­er­al and can­ton­al law in re­spect of de­cisions of the can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies in ap­plic­a­tion of this Act and its im­ple­ment­ing pro­vi­sions.

² …⁸²

¹ In­so­far as re­quired for the im­ple­ment­a­tion of this Act, and provided private ac­quis­i­tion is not an op­tion, the can­tons shall or­der land con­sol­id­a­tion pro­ced­ures. The Con­fed­er­a­tion and the can­tons may ac­quire the re­quired rights by means of the com­puls­ory pur­chase pro­ced­ure. They may del­eg­ate this power to third parties.

² The com­puls­ory pur­chase pro­ced­ure shall only be ap­plied if ef­forts to se­cure a private ac­quis­i­tion or for land con­sol­id­a­tion are un­suc­cess­ful.

³ The can­tons may de­clare the Fed­er­al Act of 20 June 1930⁸⁴ on Com­puls­ory Pur­chase to be ap­plic­able in their im­ple­ment­ing reg­u­la­tions. They shall spe­cify that the can­ton­al gov­ern­ment de­cide on ob­jec­tions that re­main in dis­pute.⁸⁵

⁴ For works that in­volve the ter­rit­ory of two or more can­tons, the fed­er­al law on com­puls­ory pur­chase ap­plies. The Fed­er­al De­part­ment of the En­vir­on­ment, Trans­port, En­ergy and Com­mu­nic­a­tions shall de­cide on com­puls­ory pur­chase mat­ters.

⁵ The sur­faces in the space provided for wa­ters that are ex­ploited shall wherever pos­sible re­main in the pos­ses­sion of the farm­ers. They are deemed to be areas re­served for pro­mot­ing biod­iversity.⁸⁶

¹The pen­alty shall be a cus­todi­al sen­tence of up to three years or a mon­et­ary pen­alty for any per­son who wil­fully:⁸⁸

a.

un­law­fully dis­charges in­to wa­ters sub­stances which may pol­lute wa­ter dir­ectly or in­dir­ectly, al­lows them to in­filt­rate or stores or spreads them out­side wa­ters in such a way as to cre­ate a wa­ter pol­lu­tion risk (Art. 6);

b.

in his or her ca­pa­city as the per­son re­spons­ible for an in­stall­a­tion which con­tains li­quids which may pol­lute wa­ter does not take the steps in terms of struc­tures and equip­ment re­quired by this Act or does not keep these in work­ing con­di­tion and thereby pol­lutes wa­ter or cre­ates a pol­lu­tion risk (Art. 22);

c.

does not main­tain the re­quired wa­ter en­dow­ment laid down by the au­thor­it­ies or does not take the re­quired meas­ures for wa­ter pro­tec­tion be­low a point of with­draw­al (Art. 35);

d.

un­law­fully ar­ti­fi­cially re­in­forces or un­law­fully cor­rects wa­ter­courses (Art. 37);

e.

cov­ers or cul­verts a wa­ter­course without a per­mit or con­trary to the con­di­tions of such a per­mit (Art. 38);

f.

in­tro­duces sol­id sub­stances in­to a lake without a per­mit from the can­ton­al au­thor­ity or con­trary to the con­di­tions of such a per­mit (Art. 39 para. 2);

g.

ex­tracts or un­der­takes pre­par­at­ory ex­cav­a­tions for the ex­trac­tion of gravel, sand or any oth­er ma­ter­i­als without a per­mit or con­trary to the con­di­tions of such a per­mit (Art. 44).

² In cases of neg­li­gence, the of­fend­er shall be li­able to a mon­et­ary pen­alty of up to 180 daily pen­alty units.⁸⁹

¹The pen­alty shall be a fine of up to 20,000 francs for any per­son who wil­fully:⁹⁰

a.

con­tra­venes this Act in any oth­er way;

b.

con­tra­venes an in­di­vidu­al or­der that is com­mu­nic­ated to him and in­cludes a spe­cif­ic ref­er­ence to the pen­al­ties men­tioned in this Art­icle.

²In cases of neg­li­gence, the pen­alty shall be a fine.

³Aid­ing and abet­ting is also an of­fence.

⁴ …⁹¹

Where a vi­ol­a­tion of this Act also con­sti­tutes an of­fence un­der Art­icle 234 of the Swiss Crim­in­al Code⁹², only the lat­ter pro­vi­sion ap­plies. In all oth­er cases, the crim­in­al pro­vi­sions of this Act ap­ply con­com­it­antly with those of the Crim­in­al Code.

Art­icles 6 and 7 of the Fed­er­al Act of 22 March 1974⁹³ on Ad­min­is­trat­ive Crim­in­al Law shall ap­ply by ana­logy to of­fences un­der this Act.

The Fed­er­al Act of 8 Oc­to­ber 1971⁹⁴ on the Pro­tec­tion of Wa­ters against Pol­lu­tion (the Wa­ters Pro­tec­tion Act) is re­pealed.

…⁹⁵

The can­tons shall en­sure that at the latest 15 years after this Act comes in­to force the op­er­a­tion of any wa­ter treat­ment plant is no longer im­paired by per­man­ent flows of non-pol­luted waste wa­ter (Art. 12 para. 3).

The can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies shall lay down the trans­ition­al peri­od for the ad­just­ment of ma­nure stor­age fa­cil­ity ca­pa­cit­ies ac­cord­ing to the ur­gency of in­di­vidu­al cases. They shall en­sure that at the latest 15 years after the entry in­to force of this Act all such stor­age fa­cil­it­ies are im­proved.

¹In cases where a wa­ter­course is sub­stan­tially af­fected by wa­ter with­draw­als, it shall be re­medi­ated be­low the point of with­draw­al ac­cord­ing to the in­struc­tions of the au­thor­it­ies in so far as is pos­sible without in­fringing ex­ist­ing wa­ter use rights to the ex­tent of jus­ti­fy­ing a claim for com­pens­a­tion by the user.

²The au­thor­it­ies shall or­der more ex­tens­ive re­medi­ation meas­ures in cases which con­cern wa­ter­courses situ­ated in land­scapes or in­clud­ing hab­it­ats which are lis­ted in na­tion­al or can­ton­al in­vent­or­ies, or in cases where over­rid­ing pub­lic in­terests re­quire it. The pro­ced­ures for as­cer­tain­ing wheth­er com­pens­a­tion must be paid and for fix­ing their amount shall be based on the pro­ced­ures con­tained in the Com­puls­ory Pur­chase Act of 20 June 1930⁹⁸.

³ If small hy­dro-elec­tric power plants or oth­er in­stall­a­tions on wa­ters of his­tor­ic value are af­fected by the or­der for more ex­tens­ive re­medi­ation meas­ures in areas lis­ted in in­vent­or­ies in terms of para­graph 2, the au­thor­ity shall weigh up the in­terests of the pro­tec­tion of cul­tur­al her­it­age versus that of the lis­ted areas.⁹⁹

¹The au­thor­it­ies shall lay down the latest date for the com­ple­tion of re­medi­ation meas­ures ac­cord­ing to the ur­gency of in­di­vidu­al cases.

² They shall en­sure that re­medi­ation is com­pleted by the end of 2012 at the latest.¹⁰⁰

¹The can­tons shall es­tab­lish an in­vent­ory of ex­ist­ing wa­ter with­draw­als ac­cord­ing to Art­icle 29, which shall con­tain in­form­a­tion on:

a.

the amount of wa­ter with­drawn;

b.

the re­sid­ual flow;

c.

the re­quired wa­ter en­dow­ment;

d.

the leg­al situ­ation.

²They shall eval­u­ate the wa­ter with­draw­als lis­ted in the in­vent­ory and ad­ju­dic­ate wheth­er and to what ex­tent re­medi­ation is ne­ces­sary. Their find­ings shall take the form of a re­port. As far as pos­sible this shall in­clude the time-spans over which re­medi­ation must be com­pleted.

³They shall present their in­vent­or­ies to the fed­er­al au­thor­ity with­in two years and their re­port with­in five years after this Act comes in­to force.

¹In cases of planned wa­ter with­draw­als for which li­cences were gran­ted be­fore the entry in­to force of this Act, the pro­tec­tion of wa­ters be­low the point of with­draw­al shall be guar­an­teed by the meas­ures re­quired by the law in so far as this is pos­sible without caus­ing in­fringe­ments of ex­ist­ing wa­ter util­isa­tion rights which would re­quire com­pens­a­tion. No right of com­pens­a­tion shall ex­ist in re­spect of meas­ures taken un­der Art­icle 31 of this Act in cases where li­censes were gran­ted after June 1, 1987.

²In cases where over­rid­ing pub­lic in­terests re­quire more ex­tens­ive pro­tec­tion, the au­thor­it­ies shall re­quire all ne­ces­sary meas­ures to be taken in ac­cord­ance with this Act. The pro­ced­ures for as­cer­tain­ing wheth­er com­pens­a­tion must be paid and fix­ing their amount shall be based on the pro­ced­ures con­tained in the Com­puls­ory Pur­chase Act of 20 June 1930¹⁰¹.

³The au­thor­it­ies shall re­quire such meas­ures to be taken at the latest be­fore the com­mence­ment of the build­ing work for the wa­ter with­draw­al in­stall­a­tion in ques­tion.

The per­sons re­spons­ible for ex­ist­ing hy­dro­power plants and of oth­er in­stall­a­tions on wa­ters are ob­liged, with­in 20 years of this pro­vi­sion com­ing in­to force, to take the ap­pro­pri­ate re­medi­ation meas­ures in ac­cord­ance with Art­icles 39a and 43a.

¹ The can­tons shall plan the meas­ures in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 83aand spe­cify the dead­lines for their im­ple­ment­a­tion. The plan­ning also in­cludes the meas­ures that must be im­ple­men­ted by per­sons re­spons­ible for hy­dro­power plants in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 10 of the Fed­er­al Act of 21 June 1991¹⁰³ on Fish­ing.

² The can­tons shall sub­mit the plans to the Con­fed­er­a­tion by 31 Decem­ber 2014.

³ They shall re­port to the Con­fed­er­a­tion every four years on the meas­ures that have been im­ple­men­ted.

¹This Act is sub­ject to op­tion­al ref­er­en­dum.

²The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall de­term­ine the com­mence­ment date.

Com­mence­ment date: 1 Novem­ber 1992¹⁰⁵