1. Nutrient Standards: Proposals for further work
Geoff Phillips, Uli Claussen & Sandra Poikane

2. Why do we need to do more work ?
Wide range of nutrient standard values in use as a result of :
Many EU types, making comparison difficult.
Different approaches used to determining values needed to support good ecological status.
Different use of these numerical values (different risk thresholds)
Important consequences for water management!

3. Workshop recommended further work
To collect nutrient standards
Also how nutrient standards were set
And how nutrient standards are used
Check relationships between biology and nutrients:
do nutrient standards correspond to “good” class boundary ?

4. Next Steps
No progress since due to limited resources and the likely difficulty of improving comparisons given the wide range of EU typologies.
October ECOSTAT confirmed the need for more work & proposed a further workshop in 2014
New work on a broad typology is now available
UK and DE have some resource available to work with JRC during 2014

5. Proposed approach
Organise the collection of new information during summer 2014
Compile and analyse this information
Hold a workshop in December 2014 or early 2015 if sufficient progress is made
Provide a report of workshop for April 2015
Good practice guidance on deriving and applying nutrient standards

6. What we propose to do - 1
Check and finalise report of Birmingham workshop by May 2014, then new work to
Update comparisons by asking all MS to provide nutrient standards
for representative lake/river types that can be linked to broad typology
for coastal / transitional waters that can be linked to broad typology/relevant spatial resolution used under the MSFD

7. What we propose to do - 2 How the nutrient standards were established
How the nutrient standards are used
Explore relationships between biology and nutrients

8. Relationships between biology and nutrients are uncertain
Data demonstrates a wide range of P for any WFD status class
Splitting into types will minimise this but there will still be many water bodies where classifications for nutrients and biology will be different
e.g. Biology Good & Phosphorus Moderate
Phosphorus v Macrophyte & Phytobenthos for UK Rivers

9. What we propose to do - 3
Best practice examples in developing relationships between biology and nutrients
How is mis-match between WFD nutrients & biological status interpreted
Consider developing good practice guidance on developing and applying nutrient standards

10. Comparisons of standards with data
Look at range of nutrients in different WFD classes
Distributions suggest potential class boundaries – compare with standards being used
Range of TP in LCB1 lakes classified using CBGIG common metric for phytoplankton
Can only achieve this if appropriate data can be quickly extracted from existing collated data, (we cannot collect new data)

11. Organization
Will require a knowledgeable person in each MS to provide information
Small ad-hoc group prepared to develop the detail and steer the process
Leading : JRC, UK (inland waters), DE (transitional, coastal and marine waters)
Needs ECOSTAT agreement and active participation