On June 18-19, WAREG held its 35ᵗʰ General Assembly in Athens, hosted by the Regulatory Authority for Energy, Waste and Water of Greece (RAAEY). The two-day assembly opened with progress reports from WAREG’s Working Groups on Tariffs, Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), the Drinking Water Directive (DWD) and the Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive (UWWTD) and then moved on to debate the EU’s new Water Resilience Strategy, draw real-time lessons on service continuity from Portugal and review the draft 2026-28 financial plan.
WAREG Members noted the preliminary KPI benchmarking results, endorsed a Europe-wide tariff survey, examined early findings on Drinking Water Directive transposition, and launched a call for proposals to research extended-producer-responsibility schemes for advanced wastewater treatment.
Building on that technical foundation, members analysed the European Commission’s newly released Water Resilience Strategy, agreeing to use the Working Group outputs as evidence for future regulatory guidance on drought, climate and energy-system shocks. A dedicated round-table, led by Portugal’s ERSAR, distilled operational lessons from recent Iberian power outages and highlighted the importance of coordinated contingency planning.
The Assembly also reviewed WAREG’s 2024 financial statement and held an initial discussion on a draft action and financing plan for 2026-28, to be adopted at the next GA in December 2025.
Prof. Vera Eiró, President of WAREG, commented: “Our Working Groups transform common challenges into concrete regulatory solutions. WAREG’s technical work is moving forward, and this shows how evidence-based cooperation can promote affordable, transparent and climate-resilient water services in Europe.”
Prof. Dimitrios Psychoyios, Vice-President of RAAEY, added: “RAAEY has successfully hosted the 35th General Assembly of WAREG in Athens, bringing together water regulatory authorities from across Europe. The Greek Regulator presented the progress accomplished structuring the Greek regulatory framework for water services and exchanged valuable experiences with the other European partners.
Together, we are strengthening the cooperation for a sustainable water management, resilient to the challenges of the climate change.”
Participating to the opening remarks, Mr. Stavros Papastavrou, Greek Minister of Environment and Energy, stated : “Water is a fundamental element. It sustains life, protects public health, supports economic development, and maintains environmental balance. Effective water management remains one of the greatest challenges of our time—a challenge further intensified by the climate crisis, which profoundly affects water systems, especially in the Mediterranean region. In many ways, the climate crisis is a water crisis, and Greece is no exception. Our country ranks 19th globally in terms of water scarcity risk, and our reserves are at historically low levels.
Our priority is to develop a coherent and holistic national water management plan. In this context, WAREG´s experience is invaluable.”
The 36ᵗʰ WAREG General Assembly and the 4ᵗʰ European Forum on the Regulation of Water Services will take place in Brussels on 3–4 December 2025.
Furthermore, the remarks from EU Commissioner for the Mediterranean Šuica, the Greek Environment & Energy Minister Papastavrou, Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly President Rousopoulos and Supreme Administrative Court Justice Spyridoula underlined the strategic weight now attached to resilient, affordable and transparent water services across Europe.
About WAREG
Established in 2014, WAREG unites 34 regulatory authorities and ministries responsible for the economic regulation of water and wastewater services across Europe. The association promotes independent, evidence-based regulation to secure high-quality, sustainable and affordable services for more than 500 million citizens.
Media contact
Vittorio Graziano, Externals Relations Manager
WAREG – European Water Regulators
secretariat@wareg.org