Environmental Monitoring

This information helps to assess the state of our environment, to identify where further actions are required to improve water quality or ecosystem health and where further investigation is required. It also helps determine the effectiveness of our regional policies and plans and contributes to national environmental reporting.

River water quality and ecology monitoring reports

Overview Nelson’s river water quality and ecology monitoring programme provides information on the stream health across the five Freshwater Management Units. Water quality and ecosystem health are currently monitored at 27 State of Environment (SOE) sites. These sites were chosen to represent the geographic nature and major land uses across the region. Additional monitoring sites for targeted water quality investigations are also reported on here using National Policy for Freshwater Management (NPS-FM 2020) attributes.

• 2022 River water quality monitoring report
• 2022 River ecology monitoring report

Recreational bathing water quality monitoring report

Bacteria levels are monitored by Nelson City Council across six river and five marine recreation bathing sites over summer. This monitoring reporting is used to identify risks to public health from disease-causing organisms and toxic algae. People can then make informed decisions about where, when, and how they use rivers and the marine environment for recreation to minimise the risk of illness from harmful waterborne pathogens that may be present.

• 2022-23 Recreation bathing water quality monitoring report
• 'Can I swim here?' - Summer Recreation bathing results reported daily on LAWA