The history of Lake Geneva

Today, thanks to all the work carried out around Lake Geneva over the past 50 years, total phosphorus levels were down to 19 µg/L in 2015. However, this was far from always being the case!

The eutrophication of Lake Geneva has been a key issue for CIPEL since its creation in 1962. Phosphorus levels, the cause of this eutrophication, rose from less than 15 µg/L before the 1960s, to over 80 µg/L in the 1970s, peaking at 89.5 µg/L in 1979.

Faced with this situation, all the water stakeholders in the Lake Geneva basin took parallel action on a number of fronts:

• a major effort to improvewastewater treatment, notably with the construction of numerous wastewater treatment plants, which has led to improved water quality, including bacteriological quality, enabling Lake Geneva to continue to be an important source of drinking water for almost 900,000 people;
• theban on phosphates in detergents in Switzerland (1986) and France (2007 in household detergents, 2012 for industrial uses);
• raising awareness among the general public, elected representatives, farmers and water stakeholders throughout the region.