The EU Commission has published its final evaluation document on the sewage sludge directive covering the whole lifetime of the directive since its adoption in 1986.
The study assesses the directive’s effectiveness, efficiency, coherence with other EU objectives, as well as its added value and relevance. According to its findings, many Member States have gone beyond the limits set out in the Directive, putting stricter requirements in their national legislation and also requirements for sewage sludge treatment such as composting and anaerobic digestion, thereby going beyond what’s required by the directive which is not prescriptive about the type of treatment to be applied.
Interestingly, the document cites sludge competition with bio-waste as one of the hindering factors of sewage sludge use. Also, the lack of harmonised end-of-waste criteria for compost and/or digestate could present a barrier to sewage sludge application.
Here you can find the whole report together with its executive summary.