Have you ever been at the coast and noticed a frothy foam at the water’s edge? From April to August, it’s fairly common to see these discoloured, sometimes creamy-looking and bad smelling foamy patches in the sea. You might think …
Today (15 May) marks the start of this year’s bathing water season. Between now and the end of September, millions of people will head to bathing waters to relax and swim. Following Defra’s recent announcement of 27 new bathing waters, …
A recent collaboration involving the Environment Agency, the environmental consultancy Jacobs and Manchester Metropolitan University (MMU) is shining a light on the role of restored saltmarshes in storing blue carbon – carbon captured by the oceans and coastal ecosystems. The …
The Environment Agency conducts weekly sampling during the bathing water season, which spans from May to September. Across the UK, there are 424 designated bathing water sites, 49 of these sit within Wessex. Each one of these sites is …
Our blog on 1 February explained how we approach monitoring, sampling and testing of bathing waters and our approach to keeping public informed and warned when there are short term risks of pollution which bathers would rightly want to be …
This Christmas #BinIt4Beaches and the Love Water partnership are reminding people of the problems caused by putting fats, oils and grease going down the sink instead of into the proper bin, and how easy it is to avoid them.
This Christmas millions of people will be preparing a traditional roast dinner for the family. Much time and effort goes into preparing and cooking the roast dinner, but there’s not many of us who like to spend much time clearing …
Walking up and down beaches with sampling gear during a heatwave may not be everyone’s ideal job but I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. I am lucky that during the summer, my job consists of sampling the water quality …
Every year millions of us visit beaches and lakes across England. Over 400 of these are designated as bathing waters and it’s the Environment Agency’s job to test the water at each to see how clean it is and provide …
30 years in the job and I’m still being approached by members of the public commenting on just how fabulous our beaches are. There’s not many people who can count themselves lucky enough to go to the beach every day …
