Press Release

December 21, 2006
  • Water & Soil

Results of the FY2005 Water Quality Survey of Public Water Areas

The Ministry of the Environment (MOE) has put together the results of the nationwide water quality survey of public water areas implemented by the national and local governments in FY2005, pursuant to the Water Pollution Control Law.

1. Health Items
Most of the monitoring points have achieved the environmental quality standards (hereinafter referred to as the "EQSs") for 26 of the human health items, with the EQS compliance rate reaching 99.1%.

2. Living Environment Items
(1) In terms of the compliance with the EQSs for BOD and COD, typical indicators of water quality for organic contamination, the overall compliance rate was 83.4%, with 87.2% for rivers, 53.4% for lakes and reservoirs, and 76.0% for sea and coastal areas. Compared with the previous year, rates for lakes and reservoirs and sea and coastal areas increased, but as a whole, the rate has decreased by 1.8%. The compliance rate of lakes and reservoirs remains low.

(2) The EQS compliance rate for total nitrogen and total phosphorus in lakes and reservoirs remained low at 46.6%, although the rate increased by 2.7% compared to the previous year. As for sea and coastal areas, the EQS compliance rates for total nitrogen and phosphorus was 82.2%, an increase of 3.9%.

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