Historic GQA Headline Indicators of Water Courses - Nutrients - NITRATE GQA GRADES 2009 (E

Over 3000 sampling sites provide nitrate quality grades for approximately 22500 km of watercourses in England for 2009. The General Quality Assessment Headline Indicator scheme was the Environment Agency's national method for creating a water quality indicator based on rivers and canals. This record covers the final year of the scheme, with data graded from 'Very low' to 'Very high' based on nitrate concentrations.

Use Cases

• Assess historical nitrate pollution levels in English rivers based on the GQA grading scheme.
• Compare regional water quality across England using the network of over 3000 sampling sites.
• Analyze trends in nutrient concentrations relative to natural baselines described in the scheme.
• Support policy evaluation by providing a consistent national assessment of water quality for 2009.

Strengths

• Covers over 3000 sampling sites providing a national-scale assessment.
• Grades water quality on a consistent 1-6 scale from 'Very low' to 'Very high' nitrate concentrations.
• Provides information for approximately 22500 km of watercourses in England.

Limitations

• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

Environment Agency

Collection Method

National water quality indicator scheme based on sampling from rivers and canals.

Time Range

2009

Freshness

Last updated 2026-07-06 07:11:38.109086; freshness should be verified.

Geography

England