The organisational and legal framework of the water industry (water supply and sewage) is currently under substantial restructuring pressure.

In Germany, a modernisation process is designed to keep up with the continuing liberalisation initiatives on the European level. In addition to that, factual changes stemming from the growing financial crisis of municipalities and caused by the market entry of new specialised companies (e.g. energy supply companies discover the water sector as a new field of business activity) need to be addressed as well.

In this complex situation we counsel water supply and sewage companies, energy supply companies as well as industrial customers. The focus are water concession contracts as well as management and operation agreements, the take-over of complete water supply and sewage assets (companies) and the new field of sewage concession contracts. When restructuring organisational forms in the sewage sector, our services include not only the legal aspects but also the evaluation of the implementation from a business point of view.

Next to providing support for restructuring processes, we also help our clients with solving legal "every day life problems". To name just a few: Question regarding the home owner's obligation to connect to a network and to its exclusive use (so-called "Anschluss- und Benutzungszwang"), the drafting of water delivery contracts (purchasing water from an upstream supplier/delivering water to redistributors)), water supply contracts (water supply for final customers), sewage and discharge contracts; in case of usage relations under official authority we provide solutions in the context of fees and tariffs, as well as problems concerning the issuance/extension of licenses under water law (ground water extraction, sewage discharge), sewages and extraction fees.

Contact persons in this area are Rudolf Böck (Munich), Dr. Martin Riedel (Berlin), Daniel Schiebold (Berlin).