Estuarine water quality monitoring around the estuaries and sea loughs of Northern Ireland and offshore sites (1990-)

The Marine Pollution Monitoring Management Group (MPMMG) created the National Monitoring Plan (NMP) to extend the North Sea Task Force (NSTF) efforts and achieve a unified coastal water monitoring programme for all waters around the United Kingdom. In 1989, it was recognised that Estuarine Classification in Northern Ireland was inadequate and the EPD (Environment Protection Division (DOE(NI))) decided that the best way to build up a databank of consistent monitoring information which could be used for classification was to support the integrated approach and extend the NMP in the Province's estuaries and sea loughs. This approach is now called the Estuarine and Coastal Waters Monitoring Programme (ECWMP). The ECWMP incorporates a comprehensive plan to cover four recorded coastal (MPMMG) sites around the Province. The NMP records three of these as offshore sites whilst the fourth is defined as an intermediate site (outside Belfast Lough). There are 29 more sites spread over Northern Ireland's seven major estuaries and sea loughs. Thus the ECWMP is a programme which facilitates the establishment of a database which will permit the scientifically justifiable classification of all of the Province's saline waters. The basic concept in the execution of the ECWMP incorporates the objectives of covering all of the above parameters on a bi-monthly basis although the adverse weather conditions prevailing around the winter months usually precluded these objectives at that time. Spatial and temporal trends can then be established. Other determinands are measured at the four MPMMG sites such as trace organics, pesticides and metals; this is on an annual basis.

海洋污染监测与管理小组（MPMMG）制定国家监测计划（NMP），旨在扩展北海任务小组（NSTF）的工作，并实现针对英国周边所有海域的统一海岸水域监测计划。1989年，鉴于北爱尔兰的河口分类不足，环境保护局（EPD，DOE(NI)）决定，建立一套可用于分类的、一致的监测信息数据库的最佳途径是支持综合方法，并将NMP扩展至该省的河口和海湖。此方法现被称为河口与海岸水域监测计划（ECWMP）。ECWMP涵盖省内的四个记录海岸（MPMMG）站点，其中NMP记录了其中的三个为海上站点，而第四个则被定义为中间站点（位于贝尔法斯特湖之外）。此外，还有29个站点分布在北爱尔兰的七个主要河口和海湖中。因此，ECWMP是一项促进建立数据库的计划，该数据库将允许对省内的所有盐碱水域进行科学合理的分类。ECWMP的基本概念是在执行过程中，旨在每两个月覆盖上述所有参数，尽管冬季的恶劣天气条件通常阻碍了这些目标的实现。然后可以确立空间和时间趋势。在其他四个MPMMG站点，还测量了如痕量有机物、杀虫剂和金属等指标；这是按年度进行的。