Environmental Monitoring
Environmental monitoring is undertaken to understand the quality of streams, lakes, estuaries, and coastal waters. Monitoring can be conducted at regular or fixed sites on a continuous basis, at selected sites on an as-needed, temporary or seasonal basis, or at random sites or on an emergency basis.
Environmental monitoring helps to characterize waters and identify changes or trends in water quality over time; identify specific existing or emerging water quality problems; gather information to design specific pollution prevention or remediation programs; determine whether program goals such as compliance with pollution regulations or implementation of effective pollution control actions are being met; and to respond to emergencies, such as spills, floods and more.
Online monitors or offline analyzers can be used to obtain real-time high frequency data during the various instances when environmental monitoring is conducted; improving how monitoring is conducted.