High-Frequency Water Quality Measurements from Lough Neagh Buoy

A multiparameter sonde records water temperature, dissolved oxygen, phycocyanin, turbidity, and specific conductivity every 30 minutes at Rea's Wood, Antrim. Data is collected by NIEA's Freshwater Monitoring and Assessment Team as part of a long-term monitoring project and is uploaded to the Lough Neagh platform with a short delay. The data is provisional, non-validated, and may be subject to revision.

Use Cases

• Modeling diurnal and seasonal water quality cycles based on 30-minute measurement intervals.
• Detecting algal blooms based on phycocyanin fluorescence (RFU) measurements.
• Analyzing the relationship between specific conductivity and other water quality parameters.
• Monitoring dissolved oxygen saturation levels for aquatic habitat health assessment.
• Calibrating or validating hydrodynamic water quality models using high-frequency sensor data.

Strengths

• High-frequency temporal resolution with data recorded every 30 minutes.
• Specific sensor accuracy and measurement ranges are documented for each parameter (e.g., temperature accuracy +/- 0.1°C).
• Data is part of a long-term monitoring project, suggesting potential for time-series analysis.

Limitations

• Data is explicitly flagged as non-validated and provisional, subject to revision.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

NIEA’s Freshwater Monitoring and Assessment Team, deployed on a buoy.

Collection Method

Automated sensor measurements from a deployed multiparameter sonde.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-18 11:24:13.231382; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Rea’s Wood bathing water site, Antrim, Lough Neagh, Northern Ireland.