Pressures & Impacts
The Pressures and Impacts assessment was completed in 2005. The assessment reviewed the impact of human activity on surface waters and groundwaters, and identified those water bodies that were at risk of failing to meet the Water Framework Directive's environmental objectives.
The central question of the Pressure and Impact assessment was 'which water bodies are at risk of failing the environmental objectives set out in the Directive?'
['At risk' means there is a likelihood that a water body will fail to meet the Directive's environmental objectives by 2015, unless appropriate management action is taken.]
'At risk' does not necessarily mean that the water bodies are already suffering poor status, but it does highlight areas where appropriate management actions should be applied to ensure that good status is maintained, or to ensure it is achieved in future.
The Pressure and Impact analysis has used a variety of methods and datasets, reflecting differences in availability and quality of data in Northern Ireland. Some assessments have used data recording environmental impacts, e.g. water quality, flora and fauna populations from current monitoring programmes, while others have used the presence of pressures on the environment, e.g. water abstraction sites and locations of physical structures such as weirs, which may lead to an environmental impact.
These different approaches reflect the nature of the data and information available to these assessments. The extent and quality of available data and information will improve in future cycles making later assessments more comprehensive and robust. This will include ensuring compatibility of assessments in cross border water bodies and catchments as work progresses in the Republic of Ireland. Nevertheless, we believe that this first analysis provides a sound basis from which to develop monitoring programmes and the river basin management planning process.
The results of the first pressure and impact analysis are detailed in the Characterisation Report.
