How does the UK support Intercalibration?

The UK has taken a very active role in Intercalibration. For example, UKTAG has helped develop EU guidance on:

• The process;

• The protocol for deriving biological class boundaries; and

• The interpretation of class boundaries for eutrophication

All our UK work on methods of biological assessment and classification has followed this guidance.

UKTAG representatives are also co-ordinating the technical work for transitional (estuarine) and coastal waters across the EU, and are playing a leading role on Intercalibration for rivers and lakes for countries of central and northern Europe.

We expect the European Commission to set some class boundaries by mid June 2007, an additional class boundaries by the end of 2007. Any information produced after that will influence the next River Basin Planning cycle.

Guidance on the classification of waterbodies and intercalibration of status classes between Member States has been developed at the European level for the purposes of the WFD, to ensure consistency across Europe:

http://ies.jrc.cec.eu.int/eewai.html