Declines in phosphorus concentration in the upper River Thames (UK): Links to sewage effluent cleanup and extended end-member mixing analysis

Neal, Colin; Jarvie, Helen P.; Williams, Richard J.; Love, Alison; Neal, Margaret; Wickham, Heather; Harman, Sarah; Armstrong, Linda K.

doi:10.1016/j.scitotenv.2009.10.055

Cited by 63 publications

(71 citation statements)

References 71 publications

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“…Tertiary treatment has been installed at the 36 largest STW (serving approximately 2.7 million people) upstream of the tidal limit since 2003, resulting in an average 85 % reduction in phosphorus load from each sewage works (Kinniburgh and Barnett, 2010). This has resulted in significant reductions in SRP concentration in the River Thames and its tributaries during the 2000s (Kinniburgh and Barnett, 2010;Neal et al, 2010a). Over the coming decade, the population within the Thames basin is likely to increase further, with the planned building of an extra 375 000 homes within the basin by 2016 (Environment Agency., 2009).…”

Section: Catchment Descriptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The water quality and chlorophyll-a concentration of the River Thames at Wallingford (Figure 1) has been monitored at weekly interval from 1997 to to 2007(Neal et al, 2010a, and from …”

Section: Study Sitesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Many UK rivers have seen significant reductions in P concentration, due primarily to the introduction of phosphate removal at sewage treatment works (STW) Bowes et al, 2010b;Foy, 2007;Jarvie et al, 2002b;Neal et al, 2010a). These reduced P loadings have delivered the intended improvements in ecology in some rivers (Bowes et al, In press;Kelly et al, 2009), but many others have seen no change in either algal biomass or community structure (Kelly and Wilson, 2004;Neal et al, 2010b), because the current P concentrations are still in excess, and therefore do not limit algal growth rate.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…These data were used to test the hypothesis that the improvements in water quality observed in other studies (Kinniburgh and Barnett, 2010;Neal et al, 2010a) have reduced phytoplankton concentration in the Thames. This paper then aimed to identify the Phosphorus Limiting Concentration of periphyton (attached biofilm) for the River Thames near Oxford, using within-river flume mesocosms.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Nutrient and light limitation of periphyton in the River Thames: Implications for catchment management

Bowes

Ings

McCall

et al. 2012

Science of The Total Environment

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This version available http://nora.nerc.ac.uk/16072/ NERC has developed NORA to enable users to access research outputs wholly or partially funded by NERC. Copyright and other rights for material on this site are retained by the rights owners. Users should read the terms and conditions of use of this material at http://nora.nerc.ac.uk/policies.html#access NOTICE: this is the author's version of a work that was accepted for publication in Science of the Total Environment. Changes resulting from the publishing process, such as peer review, editing, corrections, structural formatting, and other quality control mechanisms may not be reflected in this document. Changes may have been made to this work since it was submitted for publication. A definitive version was subsequently published in Science of the Total Environment [434, 201-212 (2012) . Decreasing ambient SRP concentration from 225 µg l -1 to 173 µg l -1 had no effect on periphyton biomass accrual rate or diatom assemblage. Phosphorus limitation became apparent at 83 µg SRP l -1 , at which point a 25 % reduction in periphyton biomass was observed. Diatom assemblage significantly changed when the SRP concentration was reduced to 30 µg l -1 . Such stringent phosphorus targets are costly and difficult to achieve for the River Thames, due to the high population density and intensive agriculture within the Thames basin. Reducing light levels by shading reduced the periphyton accrual rate by 50 %.Providing shading along the River Thames by planting riparian tree cover could be an effective measure to reduce the risk of excessive algal growth. If the ecology of the Thames is to reach the WFD's "good ecological status", then both SRP concentration reductions (probably to below 100 µg l -1 ) and increased shading will be required.

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Section: Catchment Descriptionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The water quality and chlorophyll-a concentration of the River Thames at Wallingford (Figure 1) has been monitored at weekly interval from 1997 to to 2007(Neal et al, 2010a, and from …”

Section: Study Sitesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Nutrient and light limitation of periphyton in the River Thames: Implications for catchment management

Bowes

Ings

McCall

et al. 2012

Science of The Total Environment

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“…The river water quality is of a typical calcium bicarbonate type because of the high base flow contribution from the calcite rich Chalk. The soluble reactive phosphorus is typically 80 μg P/l rising slightly below the Marlborough STP to about 100 μg/l (this value was about 500 μg/l before the start of P removal from the effluent (Neal et al, 2010)). Nitrate values decline along the study reach from about 28 mg NO 3 /l to 18 mg NO 3 /l.…”

Section: Study Sitementioning

confidence: 99%

Modelling in-stream temperature and dissolved oxygen at sub-daily time steps: An application to the River Kennet, UK

Williams

Boorman

2012

Science of The Total Environment

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The River Kennet in Southern England shows a clear diurnal signal in both temperature and dissolved oxygen concentrations through the summer months. The water quality model QUESTOR was applied in a stepwise manner (adding modelled processes or additional data) in order to simulate the flow, temperature and dissolved oxygen concentrations along a 14 km reach. The aim of the stepwise model building was to find the simplest process-based model which simulated the observed behaviour accurately. The upstream boundary used was a diurnal signal of hourly measurements of temperature and dissolved oxygen. In the initial simulations, the amplitude of the signal quickly reduced to zero as it was routed through the model; a behaviour not seen in the observed data. In order to keep the correct timing and amplitude of temperature a heating term had to be introduced into the model. For dissolved oxygen, primary production from macrophytes was introduced to better simulate the oxygen pattern. Following the modifications an excellent simulation of both temperature and dissolved oxygen was possible at an hourly resolution. It is interesting to note that it was not necessary to include nutrient limitation to the primary production model. The resulting model is not sufficiently proven to support river management but suggests that the approach has some validity and merits further development.

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Water Quality

Williams¹,

Neal²,

Jarvie³

et al. 2015

Progress in Modern Hydrology: Past, Present and Future

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Declines in phosphorus concentration in the upper River Thames (UK): Links to sewage effluent cleanup and extended end-member mixing analysis

Cited by 63 publications

References 71 publications

Nutrient and light limitation of periphyton in the River Thames: Implications for catchment management

Nutrient and light limitation of periphyton in the River Thames: Implications for catchment management

Modelling in-stream temperature and dissolved oxygen at sub-daily time steps: An application to the River Kennet, UK

Water Quality

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