Catchment Data Explorer: Water Body Status Classification for England

Water body status classifications for surface waters and groundwaters in England, assessed under the Water Framework Directive. The data is published by the Environment Agency and supports river basin management plans. It was last updated on July 6, 2026.

Use Cases

• Assessing ecological status of surface water bodies based on the classification of high, good, moderate, poor, or bad.
• Evaluating chemical status compliance for surface waters based on the 'good' or 'fail' classification.
• Monitoring groundwater quantitative and chemical status using the 'good' or 'poor' classification.
• Identifying water bodies failing to achieve good status due to one or more quality elements falling below thresholds.

Strengths

• Data supports legally mandated Water Framework Directive river basin management plans.
• Uses an advanced and sophisticated approach for chemical status classification to account for persistent substances.
• Published by the authoritative Environment Agency.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Geographic coverage is implied to be England; spatial granularity is unspecified.

Provenance

Source

Environment Agency

Collection Method

Assessments conducted for the Water Framework Directive.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-07-06 07:09:22.382091; freshness should be verified.

Geography

England