World Water Day in the Lee Valley 

Lee Valley Hydrocitizenship team has celebrated the World Water Day (22.03.2016) with water and sediment sampling in the Lower Lee with Luciana Alves and Prof. Lian Lundy.

Luciana’s PhD research focuses on the impacts of an urban catchment on water and sediment quality of a receiving river in the case of lower River Lee. While water quality has been the focus of several academic research and EU/national documents, little has been done with regard to sediment quality. River Lee has been subject to increasing urbanisation in the last 100 years and it receives major discharges of treated sewage effluent.


​The research involves a combination of field, laboratory and desk-based studies. Alessandro and I joined Luciana and Lian for the collection of water and sediment samples from 11 sites selected to represent variations in drainage and land use activities. Samples are analysed for heavy metals and persistent organic pollutants.

---

​We started the day at 8am at the Middlesex University car park and visited all the sampling points by 4pm. Luckily, it was a blue sky, beautiful London day and it was quite pleasant to spend it by the water and nature. 
 
Luciana’s work helps to enhance understanding of the process of pollutant release from sediment to water. The combined output of the this research will inform the development of a GIS-based model to enable stakeholders, e.g. the Environment Agency, to identify and prioritise pollutant sources within a catchment based on their potential to negatively impact on water and sediment quality.
 
Reference: Alves L., Lundy L., Revitt M., Wildeboer D. (2015) Evaluating the impacts of an urban catchment on water and sediment quality of a receiving river, Poster Presentation, Middlesex University