| Abstract Title: | Continuous water quality monitoring for the Environment Act - a practical demonstration |
| Presenter Name: | Mr Matt Dibbs |
| Company/Organisation: | Meteor Communications |
| Country: | United Kingdom |
Abstract Information :
The UK’s Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) requested written evidence from Meteor Communications as part of the committee’s ongoing inquiry into water quality in rivers. The submission was timely because it was made while sewage spills were the subject of intense media attention, and after the Environment Act 2021 placed a new responsibility on sewerage undertakers to progressively reduce the impact of discharges from storm overflows. For example, Section 82 of the Act states that they must monitor (DO, pH, turbidity & ammonia) upstream and downstream of an asset where water quality is potentially affected by discharges from storm overflows.
With over 300 of ESNET outstations currently monitoring UK rivers, Meteor’s Directors were concerned that some stakeholders may not be fully aware of this technological capability. Conveniently, data from the Environment Agency’s pollution investigations were made public, so Meteor was able to show the EAC examples of the ways in which ESNET technology is able to continuously track the key signatures for different types of pollution, and how these can be correlated with events such as heavy rainfall; delivering legally defensible information.
Following an online meeting with representatives of the EAC, Meteor staff were asked to provide a written submission, describing the current monitoring networks and explaining how these could be upscaled to monitor downstream and upstream of sewage treatment works in England.
This presentation will describe the ESNET (Environmental Sensor NETwork) water quality monitoring systems and provide a similar demonstration to that which was provided to the EAC.
