Are none of Northern Ireland’s rivers, lakes or coastal bodies of water of good standard

• The Water Framework Directive (WFD) provides a structure for assessing the overall quality of water bodies in Northern Ireland.
• DAERA published its most recent WFD Statistics in 2021. No rivers, lakes or coastal bodies achieved overall good status.
• Assessments were recently changed to place more emphasis on so-called “forever” chemicals. This had a significant impact on overall ratings – and could do so for years to come.

In a press release published on 21 May, Green Party NI Leader Mal O’Hara said:

“Northern Ireland is the twelfth worst place in the world for species loss. We emit the highest per capita emissions on these islands. Zero of our 495 rivers, lakes, and coastal plains meet a good standard. We have the largest illegal dump in Western Europe with no investigation into how it happened, despite the assembly agreeing to a Green proposal calling for a public enquiry. Northern Ireland’s environmental record is shameful.”

This press release contains a number of claims. This fact check focuses on the one in bold.

The claim is supported by evidence. According to the most recent Water Framework Directive Statistics published by DAERA, none of Northern Ireland’s rivers, lakes or coastal bodies of water achieved good overall status.

However, there are two other points to bear in mind. Firstly, Northern Ireland has 496 rivers, lakes and coastal bodies of water – not 495, as per the claim.

Secondly, this total absence of overall good bodies of water is directly linked to a recent change in how overall water quality is assessed. Specifically, far greater importance has been placed on the presence of certain “forever” chemicals.

Essentially, each body of water’s overall status is calculated from two things: its ecological status and its chemical status. Due to a new focus on persistent chemicals, no local water bodies achieved good chemical status, which means none could achieve good overall status.

The latest water-quality figures (from 2021) ostensibly look much worse than in comparable assessments (2018 and 2015 were the two previous years that saw Water Framework Directive figures published).

• Source

FactCheckNI asked Senator O’Hara – who currently sits in Ireland’s Seanad as well as leading his party in Northern Ireland – for some evidence to support his claim.

He pointed us in the direction of various links and news stories concerning the most recent Water Framework Directive (WFD) Statistics published by the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs (DAERA).

• Official grading

There are various different scales of water quality however NI’s official statistics are found in the WFD figures mentioned above (and cited to us by Senator O’Hara). According to DAERA:

“Within Northern Ireland, as within the rest of the UK, the Water Framework Directive (WFD) is the main driver for assessing our water environment and pushing us towards achieving good ecological status.”

But what exactly is the bottom line? This is the “overall” status of a water body, which is determined by separate appraisals of both its ecological and chemical statuses.

Each river, lake and coastal water body is graded on a five-point scale for both ecology and chemistry: high; good; moderate; poor; or bad. Every body’s overall grade is equal to the lower of its ecological and chemical grades.

• Results

WFD Statistics reports are published every few years, rather than annually. The most recent paper came in 2021. It covers various types of water body; from rivers; lakes;and coastal bodies – the three types mentioned by the Senator – as well as groundwater sites.

According to the latest report:

“In 2015, 147 (33 %) of the 450 river water bodies were classified as good or high overall status. In 2018, 141 (31 %) of river water bodies were classified as good or high overall status. In 2021, no river water bodies achieved good or high overall status…

“In 2015 and 2018, 5 (24 %) of the 21 lake water bodies were classified as good overall status. In 2021, no lakes achieved good overall status…

“In 2015, 8 (32 %) of the 25 transitional & coastal water bodies achieved good overall status and 1 (4 %) achieved high overall status. In 2018, 10 (40 %) water bodies achieved good overall status. In 2021, no water bodies achieved good overall status.”

Firstly, one should note that NI has 450 rivers, 21 lakes and 25 coastal water bodies. The original claim discusses our “495 rivers, lakes and coastal plains” however 450 + 21+ 26 = 496 (representing a small arithmetical error on Senator O’Hara’s part).

That aside, this supports the claim, which is therefore backed by evidence. However, there is some vital context.

• Changing measurements

The latest WFD report outlines how “significant changes” took place in both monitoring and overall classification of water bodies after the second-to-last WFD report and before this most recent version.

“For the first time the presence of ubiquitous, persistent, bioaccumulative, toxic (uPBT) substances, so-called ‘forever’ chemicals, have been assessed as part of chemical status. Due to their bioaccumulative and persistent nature, uPBT substances have been detected at all monitored stations and resulted in failures of all of those stations.

“It is therefore reasonable to presume that uPBT substances would cause more failures if additional stations were monitored. For this reason, the uPBT failures have been extrapolated to all surface water bodies across Northern Ireland, meaning that none of our rivers, lakes, transitional & coastal water bodies will meet overall good status (when ecological and chemical status are combined).”

In short, due to the presence (or presumed presence) of uPBTs at all water bodies, none were deemed of good chemical status, meaning none could achieve good overall status.

This means that comparisons between headline statistics in the most recent WFD findings and those that came before could be shaky.

For example, the falls of multiple percentage points in the proportion of rivers, lakes and coastal bodies that were deemed good between the 2015 and 2021 assessments (33%, 24% and 32%, respectively, all now at 0%) does not itself provide conclusive evidence that water quality reduced significantly over that time.

According to the latest WFD report:

“Although a number of these uPBT substances are now banned or have restricted use, their widespread use in the past has resulted in their accumulation in the aquatic environment with subsequent breaching of assigned Environmental Quality Standard (EQS) values. It is widely recognised that given their persistence the levels present in the aquatic environment will likely remain in breach of EQS values for some years to come. This finding is in common with European countries and indeed with countries across the globe where usage was widespread. In order to allow for a meaningful comparison with chemical status in 2015, for which the uPBT substances were not monitored, it is important that chemical classification be presented both including and excluding the uPBT substances.”

Metrics for overall classifications for rivers, lakes and coastal bodies have recently become significantly more onerous and, due to the persistence of the uPDT chemicals that are now receiving more focus, overall water body classifications may remain less than good for some time, given the way overall grades are calculated.