Water & Wastewater Treatment Magazine
Issue link: https://fhpublishing.uberflip.com/i/1062770
Databank www.wwtonline.co.uk | WWT | JANUARY 2019 | 23 GOAL 14 WASTEWATER QUALITY A signi cant majority of bath- ing waters across Britain have met the minimum standards outlined in the revised Bath- ing Water Directive (2006/7/ EC), which introduced far more stringent water quality standards as well as placing more emphasis on providing information to the public. Since the new directive was fully implemented in March 2015, bathing waters that meet minimum standards have been classi ed as 'excellent', 'good' or 'suŠ cient', while those that fail are rated 'poor'. In England, tests on 420 bathing spots carried out be- tween May and September 2018 showed only 2.1 per cent were below acceptable standards. That highlights the scale of the improvement seen on the beaches and lakes designated for swimming across the coun- try – the Environment Agency has said that 72 per cent would have failed to meet the new standards if the tests had been carried out in the early 1990s, in part due to the regulator reducing pollution from water companies and industry. Wales continues to excel with respect to its bathing wa- ter quality, with all 104 tested meeting the 'suŠ cient', 'good' or 'excellent' classi cations this year. Cemaes Bay in An- glesey had been Wales' only 'poor' beach in the 2016 and 2017 results but was upgraded to 'suŠ cient' a• er Natural Resources Wales undertook work in the area.˜ The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (SEPA), meanwhile, acknowledged in May that there is room for improvement north of the border a• er 11 of its 86 bathing waters were oŠ cially designated as 'poor' in the results from tests carried out in 2017. Even so, those results were Scotland's best to date, with 25 marked as 'excellent', and the 2018 results – yet to be oŠ cially rati ed – indicate that the number of top-ranked waters will rise to 28, even if the number with the lowest rating remain the same at 11. BATHING WATER QUALITY Malta 100% Luxembourg 100% Austria 99% Cyprus 98% Romania 98% Slovenia 98% Greece 97% Germany 97% Belgium 97% Lithuania 96% Portugal 95% Italy 95% Denmark 95% Croatia 95% Latvia 95% Spain 94% Finland 93% Bulgaria 92% Czech Rep 92% France 91% Netherlands 90% United Kingdom 88% Slovakia 88% Sweden 87% Ireland 85% Hungary 84% Poland 80% Estonia 80% 2015 97% 2016 98.5% 2017 98.3% 2018 97.9% 2015 100% 2016 99% 2017 99% 2018 100% 2015 79.8% 2016 86.9% 2017 87.2% 2018* 87.2% European Comparison - Proportion of bathing waters with good or excellent bathing water quality - 2017 England's bathing waters rated 'suffi cient' or bet- ter under Bathing Water Directive Wales' bathing waters rated 'suffi cient' or better under Bathing Water Directive Scotland's bathing waters rated 'suffi cient' or better under Bathing Water Directive 100% Bathing waters in Wales that met Bathing Water Directive standards 92.4% Bathing waters in England rated 'Excellent' or 'Good' 95.2% Bathing waters in Wales rated 'Excellent' or 'Good' 72.1% Bathing waters in Scotland rated 'Excellent' or 'Good'* 87.2% Bathing waters in Scotland that met Bathing Water Directive standards* Bathing waters in England that met Bathing Water Directive standards (Source: Environment Agency, Natural Resources Wales and SEPA results for 2018) (Source: Environment Agency, Natural Resources Wales and SEPA results for 2018) Source: European Environment Agency 97.9% 'Excellent' and 'Good' bathing waters *While Scotland's offi cial bathing water results are issued several months a er tes ng, the data here refl ects the years the tests were carried out. Results for 2018 are based on expected classifi ca ons but will not be confi rmed by the EU un l spring 2019 Source: Environment Agency Source: Natural Resources Wales Source: SEPA