We were thrilled to have a team from the BBC visit Emsworth a couple of weeks ago to film a short report on our citizen science sampling programme and pollution issues in our local harbours.
It went out on BBC Breakfast this morning, but you can catch up here or by watching the embedded video below if you missed it. It’s fantastic to have kicked off the first phase of testing and we look forward to seeing the results in the coming weeks. This is a project that has come about through local frustration at the lack of progress in limiting pollution in our harbours and waterways. Some of the issues highlighted in the report about unpermitted discharges at Lavant have been going on for years and are known about by the EA and Southern Water. Our initial results at Lavant show the levels of Streptococci are way in excess of the EA’s ‘poor’ rating.
We’d like to thank all the volunteers that have taken the samples for our first phase of testing and to Professor Alex Ford for featuring in the report. Thanks also to Emsworth Sailing Club for hosting the BBC team for the afternoon, and the young people spoke so eloquently to reporter Zoe Conway about why clean harbour water is important for them.