27-Apr-2006 - Bathing
waters off the coasts of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset
and Somerset will come under scrutiny from next
week as the Environment Agency begins its annual
programme of rigorous quality tests.
Between May 3 and the end of
September twenty samples are taken from each of
the 191 European Commission (EC) designated bathing
waters to check against strict mandatory and even
tighter guideline standards. These samples are
analysed by the Environment Agency’s laboratory
at Starcross in Devon. They are tested for a range
of factors including types of bacteria that indicate
the presence of sewage.
Compliance with mandatory standards
in recent years has been consistently over 95%
and achieved 99.5% last year. The trend of achieving
the tougher guideline standards has also improved
dramatically and has been consistently over 80%
(87.4% in 2005).
‘The South West has 1,000 kilometres
of coastline, and 191 designated bathing waters.
The coastline and bathing waters are vital to
the region’s economy, particularly in terms of
their contribution to the tourism and leisure
industry, so it is important for people to know
the waters are of a high quality,’ said Nick Smart
of the Environment Agency.
‘We will continue to work with
potential polluters in order to maintain and further
improve these already high standards.’
