The Scottish Government

This paper forms part of a series of consultations on our detailed plans to implement the Water Environment and Water Services (Scotland) Act 2003 ("the WEWS Act"). The WEWS Act transposed the European Water Framework Directive ( WFD) into Scots law and established a broad framework for the future management of our rivers, lochs, coasts and groundwaters.

This consultation paper sets out proposals for the introduction of a first set of environmental standards and conditions for the water environment in Scotland, to support implementation of the WEWS Act.

These proposed standards define the range of environmental conditions needed to support healthy aquatic life, such as oxygen levels, water flow conditions, concentrations of key chemicals and physical structure. Standards will underpin the setting of environmental objectives in the river basin management planning process.

This paper sets out three aspects of the introduction of these first proposed standards:

• the scientific basis for the proposed standards and conditions;
• how the proposed standards will be used - plans for their implementation in Scotland; and
• a provisional assessment of the likely costs and benefits of introducing the proposed standards.

We would welcome your comments on any aspect of this paper. Comments on the proposals should reach us at the address below by 13 December 2006.

We then plan to introduce the first set of environmental standards as soon as possible afterwards.