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Water Quality - EC Bathing Water Directive

 

Introduction

The main objective of the 1976 EC Bathing Water Directive (76/160/EEC) is to protect public health and the environment from faecal pollution at bathing waters.

The Directive requires Member States to identify popular bathing areas and to monitor water quality at these bathing waters throughout the bathing season, which runs from mid May to September in England.

The Directive sets a number of microbiological and physico-chemical standards that bathing waters must either comply with (‘mandatory’ standards) or endeavour to meet (‘guideline’ standards).

The two main standards used to assess the quality of bathing water are total coliforms and faecal coliforms, which are bacteria found in the guts of humans and other warm-blooded animals, and are indicators of faecal pollution.

Full details of the required standards can be found in the Annex of the Bathing Water Directive (see Legislation section below).

Legislation

The Bathing Water Directive was initially transposed into national legislation through Regulations and Directions in the early 1990s. The full texts of the Directive and Regulations are available:

Also forming part of the transposing legislation in England are:

  • The National Rivers Authority (Bathing Waters) Directions 1992.
  • Notices issued by the Secretary of State for the Environment on 5 May 1992, 14 February 1997 and 13 June 2003. These list the waters that are classified as bathing waters under the Bathing Water Directive and any transparency or colour waivers at these sites.

As a result of new bathing water identifications made under the current Bathing Water Directive, the Bathing Water Notice has been updated. The text of the draft notice can be found below:

As required under section 83(4)(a) of the Water Resources Act 1991, the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs will consider representations or objections to the draft notice which are received by 29 August 2008.  Comments can be emailed to kate.hedges@defra.gsi.gov.uk.

The schedule to this notice, entitled Bathing Waters (England) 2008, gives the complete list of identified English bathing waters.  This includes those waters listed in the previous notices of 1992, 1997 and 2003 and any amendments made to the list, including the 8 new bathing waters identified since 2003. These new waters are: Anstey’s Cove; Brighton Central; Church Cove; Clacton Beach Martello Tower; Druridge Bay North; Poole Canford Cliffs Chine; Tankerton; Yaverland.

The English list of bathing waters is referred to in Regulation 3(4)(a) of the new Bathing Water Regulations 2008, which came into effect on 14 May 2008.

Administration and implementation of the Directive

The Bathing Water Directive is administered in England by Defra and in the rest of the UK by the relevant Devolved Administration. Bathing water enquiries in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland should be directed to the Scottish Executive, Welsh Assembly Government and Department of Environment Northern Ireland respectively.

The Directive is implemented in the UK by the following regulatory authorities:

Contact details for queries relating to implementation of the Directive can be found at the above websites.

Number of identified bathing waters in the UK

In 2008, there are 414 identified and monitored bathing waters in England, 81 in Wales, 80 in Scotland and 24 in Northern Ireland, making a total of 599 bathing waters across the UK. Of these sites, 587 are coastal waters and 12 are inland freshwater sites. In 2007, there were 578 bathing waters in the UK.

Number of bathing waters in the UK

Country

2007

2008

England

414 1

414 2
Wales

80

81
Scotland

61

80
Northern Ireland

23

24
UK total

578

599

1 This number does not include three identified bathing waters (Blackpool North, Cleveleys and Duporth) that were temporarily closed during the 2007 bathing season.
2 This number does not include three identified bathing waters (Blackpool North, Barmston and Newhaven) that are temporarily closed during the 2008 bathing season.

Identification of new bathing waters in England

Defra will consider the identification of new coastal or inland bathing waters in England following an application, normally from the relevant Local Authority.

Bathing water monitoring results in England and the UK 2007

The monitoring results for England and the UK in general are compiled at the end of the bathing season and announced by Defra, usually in November.

Defra also produces a detailed summary report of mandatory compliance results for UK bathing waters (for all parameters under the Directive). The 2007 report is available via the link below:

UK compliance with the Directive

Mandatory standards

Meeting the mandatory water quality standards of the Bathing Water Directive is the minimum legal requirement. Mandatory standards are given for 10 parameters: total coliforms, faecal coliforms, salmonella, enteroviruses, pH, colour, mineral oils, surface active substances (detergents), phenols and transparency. The Directive also sets the minimum frequency at which bathing waters should be sampled.

The mandatory standards used by the European Commission to determine compliance of bathing waters with the Directive are the microbiological parameters - total and faecal coliforms, and three physico-chemical parameters - surface active substances, mineral oils and phenols. Cases of non-compliance with the physico-chemical parameters are extremely rare so compliance in the UK each year is normally determined by the extent of pollution by total and faecal coliform bacteria.

To comply with these standards, bathing waters must not exceed values of 10,000 total coliforms per 100ml and 2000 faecal coliforms per 100ml in 95% of samples.

In 2007, 97.8% of bathing waters in England complied with these microbiological standards, with 9 of the 414 monitored waters failing to meet the minimum standards of the Directive. This is a slight drop in compliance from the record figure of 99.5% achieved in 2006.

The table below shows percentage compliance with the mandatory standards for total and faecal coliforms, in England only and in the UK, over the last decade.

Year

'98

'99

'00

'01

'02

'03

'04

'05

'06

'07

England
% compliance

89.9

90.3

94.3

97.8

98.5

98.8

98.3

98.8

99.5

97.8

UK
% compliance

88.9

91.4

94.1

95.3

97.8

98.4

97.7

98.4

99.5

96.5

Guideline standards

The Bathing Water Directive also sets more stringent guideline microbiological standards that Member States must endeavour to observe.

To comply with the guideline standards, bathing waters must not exceed values of 500 total coliforms per 100ml and 100 faecal coliforms per 100ml in 80% of water quality samples, and 100 faecal streptococci per 100ml in 90% of samples taken.

In 2007, 72.5% of all bathing waters in England met this tighter standard.

The guideline water quality standard is required to fulfil the water quality criterion of the international Blue Flag award scheme.

The table below shows percentage compliance with the guideline standards for total coliforms, faecal coliforms, and faecal streptococci, in England only and in the UK, over the last decade.

Year

'98

'99

'00

'01

'02

'03

'04

'05

'06

'07

England
% compliance

37.2

37.5

44.4

59.6

69.8

73.5

67.1

73.7

75.1

72.5

UK
% compliance

36.2

41.8

44.6

57.3

67.6

74.2

67.9

74.0

75.0

70.8

See the Environment Agency website for more detailed information on UK bathing water quality results, including compliance results for individual bathing waters.

UK compliance compared with other EU Member States

The UK’s bathing water results are reported to the European Commission by 31 December each year to inform its annual report, which is published in May or June of the following year:

The 2007 report indicates that the UK achieved results that were above the EU average for compliance with the mandatory microbiological standards of the Directive but compliance with the more stringent guideline standards remained below the EU average.

Further improvements to bathing water quality

Since 1995, water companies in England and Wales have invested over £1 billion to bring about improvements to sewerage infrastructure, which has resulted in a steady improvement of bathing water quality.

Compliance with mandatory standards in England has improved steadily from 87.7% in 1997 to 97.8% in 2007, with a record level of 99.5% achieved in 2006.  The proportion of sites meeting all bacterial guideline standards has shown a marked improvement from 35.2% in 1997 to 72.5% in 2007.

Further improvement works are planned at a number of sewage treatment works in England over the next three years (up until 2010), bringing additional benefits to bathing waters.

Despite significant improvements to the surrounding sewerage infrastructure, some bathing waters continue to be affected by diffuse water pollution, i.e. faecal pollution from agricultural and/or urban runoff after heavy rain.

Tackling sources of diffuse water pollution is the next big challenge if we are to see further significant improvements in bathing water quality. This will be delivered through initiatives such as Catchment-Sensitive Farming Project, with Defra working closely with farmers and other stakeholders to improve farming practices.

Other sources of bathing water quality information

The Environment Agency carries out the monitoring of bathing waters in England. For more detailed information on bathing water quality, including monitoring results for individual bathing waters, see the Environment Agency's website

Defra also encourages local authorities to display bathing water quality information at the beach. Here is an example of a poster used in the Defra-organised local authority poster scheme:

Local authorities may also display bathing water information on their own websites.

Beach awards

There are a number of voluntary beach award schemes in operation in the UK, which have bathing water quality as an essential requirement for the award. These include the Blue Flag scheme and the Good Beach Guide. For more information see the following websites:

Revision of the Bathing Water Directive

The Bathing Water Directive, which is now 30 years old, has been updated and simplified to take into account lessons learnt from its implementation, developments in science and knowledge about the risks of bathing, and the changes in environmental protection offered by more recent European water legislation.

A revised Bathing Water Directive (2006/7/EC) came into force on 24 March 2006 and must be transposed into UK law within two years of this date, although it will take longer for the new features to come into effect. Key changes include a tightening of water quality standards and a requirement to provide information about bathing waters to the public on signage on beaches and online. The revised Directive sets 4 new standards of water quality (excellent, good, sufficient and poor) and all bathing waters will be expected to achieve at least the “sufficient” classification by 2015, with limited exceptions. A consultation was issued on 12 November 2007 inviting comments on the Government’s proposals for implementing the new Directive and closed on 4 February 2008.

Further information

If you would like further information about the Bathing Water Directive or bathing waters in England, contact details for Defra can be found at Contacting Defra

Page last modified: 11 June 2008
Page published: 31 May 2002

Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs