Assessing the hydromorphological status of transitional and coastal water bodies in the Basque Country, under the European Water Framework Directive

IF 7 2区环境科学与生态学 Q1 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES

Ecological Indicators Pub Date : 2025-03-28 DOI:10.1016/j.ecolind.2025.113404

Oihana Solaun, Ángel Borja, Manuel González, Almudena Fontán

{"title":"Assessing the hydromorphological status of transitional and coastal water bodies in the Basque Country, under the European Water Framework Directive","authors":"Oihana Solaun, Ángel Borja, Manuel González, Almudena Fontán","doi":"10.1016/j.ecolind.2025.113404","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Within the Water Framework Directive, the assessment of the hydromorphological quality of water bodies is relevant in the determination of their ecological status, and in the designation of heavily modified water bodies. Based on the Hydromorphological Quality Index (HQI) developed for Ireland, this work presents an adaptation of the approach applied to the transitional and coastal waters in the Basque Country, for the last consecutive 6-year periods (2011–2016 and 2017–2022). The proposed methodology determines the overall quality (HQI<sub>g</sub>), and allows the morphological (HQI<sub>m</sub>) and hydrodynamic regime (HQI<sub>h</sub>) components to be assessed separately. Coastal water bodies showed a ’Good’ or ’High’ overall quality, while for most of the transitional water bodies it was ’Moderate’, except for Nerbioi interior, with ‘Poor’ quality in 2011–2016, and Oka Exterior and Deba, with ’Good’ quality in both periods. The approach is consistent with previous expert judgment assessments and could be useful in designing restoration scenarios.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":11459,"journal":{"name":"Ecological Indicators","volume":"173 ","pages":"Article 113404"},"PeriodicalIF":7.0000,"publicationDate":"2025-03-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Ecological Indicators","FirstCategoryId":"93","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1470160X25003346","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES","Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Abstract

Within the Water Framework Directive, the assessment of the hydromorphological quality of water bodies is relevant in the determination of their ecological status, and in the designation of heavily modified water bodies. Based on the Hydromorphological Quality Index (HQI) developed for Ireland, this work presents an adaptation of the approach applied to the transitional and coastal waters in the Basque Country, for the last consecutive 6-year periods (2011–2016 and 2017–2022). The proposed methodology determines the overall quality (HQI_g), and allows the morphological (HQI_m) and hydrodynamic regime (HQI_h) components to be assessed separately. Coastal water bodies showed a ’Good’ or ’High’ overall quality, while for most of the transitional water bodies it was ’Moderate’, except for Nerbioi interior, with ‘Poor’ quality in 2011–2016, and Oka Exterior and Deba, with ’Good’ quality in both periods. The approach is consistent with previous expert judgment assessments and could be useful in designing restoration scenarios.

查看原文本刊更多论文

求助全文

约1分钟内获得全文求助全文

来源期刊

Ecological Indicators 环境科学-环境科学

CiteScore

11.80

自引率

8.70%

发文量

1163

审稿时长

78 days

期刊介绍： The ultimate aim of Ecological Indicators is to integrate the monitoring and assessment of ecological and environmental indicators with management practices. The journal provides a forum for the discussion of the applied scientific development and review of traditional indicator approaches as well as for theoretical, modelling and quantitative applications such as index development. Research into the following areas will be published. • All aspects of ecological and environmental indicators and indices. • New indicators, and new approaches and methods for indicator development, testing and use. • Development and modelling of indices, e.g. application of indicator suites across multiple scales and resources. • Analysis and research of resource, system- and scale-specific indicators. • Methods for integration of social and other valuation metrics for the production of scientifically rigorous and politically-relevant assessments using indicator-based monitoring and assessment programs. • How research indicators can be transformed into direct application for management purposes. • Broader assessment objectives and methods, e.g. biodiversity, biological integrity, and sustainability, through the use of indicators. • Resource-specific indicators such as landscape, agroecosystems, forests, wetlands, etc.