In order to meet this Directive in Northern Ireland the Water Abstraction and Impoundment (Licensing) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 2006 have been introduced.
The UFU have outlined that this is another layer of unnecessary bureaucracy coming from Brussels given that water supplies in NI are generally abundant. However given that his is an EU requirement, Northern Ireland had no choice but to introduce legislation to this effect.
The Water Abstraction Regulations mean that anyone, including farmers, abstracting water from a borehole or directly from a watercourse may be required to register this abstraction with the Environment and Heritage Service, depending on the volume of water that they use in any one day.
The volume of water abstracted will determine the type of registration and authorisation required and this is outlined in the table (below left):
To calculate the estimated amount of water abstracted on farm, farmers can use the ready-reckoner which the UFU developed in conjunction with EHS. This can be found on the web at: www.ehsni.gov.uk/agriculture_ready_reckoner.pdf . Meters are not required.
As the UK Government has a policy of 'polluter pays principle' EHS are required to charge applicants for the registration process. The charge applies to the registration process only and farmers will not be charged for the volume of water they abstract.
EHS are currently consulting on the level of charges and UFU will be responding to this consultation paper in due course.
It is currently proposed that a one-off application charge of £135 will be applied to all applications and annual charges will apply to abstractions which exceed 100m3 per day (22,000 gallons).
The charges will not be introduced until 1 July 2008.
Therefore if farmers are required to register with EHS they should do so now to avoid paying the application fee.
For more information on the legislation contact EHS (028 9263 3482).