A Source-to-sink Contaminant Risk Framework To Support Water Quality Policy Across Scales

In the wrong place, or at excessive concentrations, nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) and sediment become contaminants. Along with pathogens, they require reduction to improve water quality. Our Land and Water National Science Challenge and Ministry for the Environment have commissioned a research programme ‘Mapping Contaminants from Source to Sink’ to inform both national and local government policy and planning on the fate of freshwater contaminants, specifically nitrogen and phosphorus species, sediment, and microbes in our environment and will be used to support the implementation of the National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management
(2020).

The overall objective of this project is to produce a national landscape classification for water quality to support contaminant risk assessment for policy option development. The classification units will describe contaminant processes within parcels of land, surface water and shallow groundwater (hydrologically connected to streams and rivers).