April 27, 2025

Monitoring the water quality of our Thames

Dear ,

This weekend, Olwen and I took part in the “Great UK WaterBlitz”, organised by FreshWaterWatch. The purpose is to, periodically, help build a national picture of water quality across the UK.

Probably unsurprisingly, the results were in line with last September: the phosphate levels were low, while the nitrate levels were off the charts.

Some people asked us: “does that mean it is (not) safe to swim?” That is a more complex question… We did not do any testing for bacteria (such as E. coli) for example. You can read more about nitrates and phosphates here.

All the results will be on the Great UK WaterBlitz website.

Frank