Action for Quality Aquatic Environments (AQuA)

Currently no rivers in Yorkshire achieve a ‘good’ or ‘high’ status under the water framework directive classifications. Funding cuts to regulatory bodies have compounded this issue by reducing the number of official monitoring samples.

Thousands of citizen scientists are already working in Yorkshire to collect valuable data on local rivers and lakes, but these measurements are often made using methods that don’t align with regulatory standards, or at locations that aren’t officially recognised in monitoring networks. As such this wealth of local knowledge often remains disconnected from the decisions that manage our rivers and lakes.

This is where the AQuA project comes in. We are developing, validating and applying new methods for chemical and microbial water quality monitoring across Yorkshire (UK). As an example we have validated a new method for quantifying E. coli levels which allows citizen scientists to incubate samples at home, and produce quantitative results within 24 hours. 

We have developed this method alongside key industrial and regulatory stakeholders, with partners including the Environment Agency and Yorkshire Water. By involving these stakeholders from the start, we have ensured that our data is credible, transparent and, crucially, usable for formal decision-making.