Cohesion policy provides significant financial support to Member States and regions in order to invest in waste water treatment infrastructures. In the programming period 2007-13, about EUR 14.4 billion are planned to co-fund related projects while significant funding was already invested in this area in the previous programming period of cohesion policy. In order to increase the environmental benefits of these infrastructures, specific Green Public Procurement criteria on waste water infrastructure have now been developed with a specific focus on reducing the costs of these installations over their lifetime. These criteria could in particular, where relevant, help public authorities building or upgrading their waste water infrastructure in the 2014-2020 programming period through cohesion policy.