Plans to work with nature so as to protect and improve water quality are coming to the fore.
Worsening water quality is one of our most pressing environmental (not to mention public health) issues. In line with EU and national policies, there’s a move away from more traditional, engineering methods.
Anglers are often the first people to note changes in rivers and lakes. For decades, they have been warning about increasing water pollution, evidenced most dramatically by fish kills.
A long time ago, people like the crusading Jerry Keating, from Kilworth, Co Cork, were making appeals to the powers-that-be to act. Not many listened, however. Today, nobody is in doubt about the serious situation in waterways.
The Maigue Rivers Trust, in Co Limerick, is doing excellent work. Nitrogen levels in the rivers Deel and Maigue have doubled in the last 12 years, the EPA has revealed, with just 5% of Limerick rivers having good water quality. A situation that’s most likely also true elsewhere.
The Waters of Life Project, based in Croom, Co Limerick, aims to reverse the loss of pristine waters.
As predictions of more heavy rainfall and consequent flooding are now coming to pass, different ways of dealing with such problems are urgently called for.
Nationally, frameworks are being devised to ensure action in specific places, with numerous benefits for water, climate change and nature. We’re told the nature-based approach can, for example, filter out 80% of heavy metal pollution.
The concept of ‘nature-based catchment management’ is not new. Some measures are already being implemented.
All of which should reduce flood risk, enhance water quality and create habitats for nature in its varied forms. Basically, the idea is to restore ecosystems by natural means.
A range of measures is needed to work together. When all are operating in unison, the measures bring multiple benefits, including carbon storage, better angling and walking amenities, according to Patrick Morrissey, of the EPA catchments unit.
Separately, An Taisce has called on the government to strengthen the proposed measures in the Nitrates Action Programme to safeguard Ireland’s water quality.
An EU directive is primarily concerned with preventing nitrates from agricultural sources from polluting ground and surface waters by promoting the use of good farming practices.
An Taisce has repeatedly raised serious concerns about the inadequacy of the protective measures being proposed for water and of legal weaknesses in the environmental assessments.
Dr Elaine McGoff, natural environment officer with An Taisce, says Ireland is facing a water quality crisis, with almost half of our rivers and lakes polluted.
“Agricultural intensification, particularly dairy intensification, is the primary driver of that. Ambitious and far-reaching changes are required to address this,’’ she urges.
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Originally Appeared Here