Water Quality Management

In addition to monitoring the amount of water we consume, our stewardship of the waterways under our control means that we have responsibilities with regard to the quality of that water.  Pollution of water is possible from ships as well as from land-based sources and we work hard to fulfil our legal responsibilities to ensure that ships operate with care when in waters under our jurisdiction.  

Pollution from land is possible from a number of sources and we have carried out a major Land Quality Assessment to ensure that we are aware of potential routes for polluting waters from land that we own.  Opportunities also exist for making sure that the potential for pollution from other operators at the ports is also reduced.

The development and maintenance of Oil Pollution Preparedness and Response Plans continue to ensure that we are well prepared the event of an oil spill in any water where we are the Harbour Authority.  These plans are prepared in conjunction with many bodies such as EN and the Environment Agency (EA), pursuant to the International Convention on Oil Pollution Preparedness Response, and Co-operation 1990 (OPRC).  It is our aim to ensure that these plans are as effective as possible, and in addition to running regular test exercises to check their robustness, we periodically carry out internal audits to help identify ways of improving our responses in the event of an oil spill.

To see the legislation that governs our management of water quality in the ports and how we have translated this into environment policy objectives refer to the Water Quality Management page in the Legislation section.