UK Monitoring

The main reasons for undertaking monitoring for the WFD are to:

• Establish an overview of the water status of each river basin district
• Classify individual water bodies as to their water status: Classification 

   

  For surface waters 3 types of monitoring are required by the WFD:

  • Surveillance – to validate the characterisation pressure and impact assessments, detect long-term trends;
  • Operational – to help classify those water bodies which are at risk of failing to meet ‘good status’; and
  • Investigative – to ascertain the cause and effects of a failure to meet ‘good status’ where it is not clear.

   

  For each surface waterbody, the Competent Authorities will assess as appropriate:

  • Biology (plankton/phytobenthos, macrophytes, invertebrates and fish);
  • Hydromorphology;
  • Physico-chemical (including organic pollutants);
  • Priority and priority-hazardous substances.

   

  For groundwaters, the monitoring requirements cover:

  • Groundwater resources through a water level monitoring network;
  • Surveillance and operational monitoring of chemical status (CIS, 2003a)

   

  The UK, like all other Member States must complete its planning by 22 December 2006, and must report to Europe our monitoring plans for operational and surveillance monitoring by March 2007.

• Useful links: Summary table of Quality Elements to be monitored under Water Framework Directive  Reporting Monitoring Results Monitoring Artificial Water Bodies and Heavily Modified Water Bodies 12a Selection of Sites and Monitoring Networks