We measure reactive phosphorus (P) which is generally in the form of orthophosphate in ground and surface water. We utilise the ammonium molybdate spectrometric method (ISO 15923-1:2013 and EPA Method 365.1) for this measurement.

Current guidance recommends that ecologically healthy rivers should not exceed annual mean phosphate concentrations of 0.1 mg/L.

We measure TON (Total Oxidized Nitrogen) as N and Nitrate by calculation. We utilise the hydrazine spectrometric method (ISO 15923-1 and EPA Method 353.1) for this measurement.

Current guidance recommends that ecologically healthy rivers should not exceed annual mean nitrate concentrations of 1 mg/L.

We utilise a miniaturised most probably number (MPN) method for quantification of E. coli (ISO 9308-3:1998).

Coastal Bathing Waters
Excellent: ≤ 250 count/100 mL (95th percentile)
Good: ≤ 500 count/100 mL (95th percentile)
Sufficient: ≤500 count/100 mL (90th percentile)
Poor: Sufficient standard not met

Inland Bathing Waters
Excellent: ≤ 500 count/100 mL (95th percentile)
Good: ≤ 1000 count/100 mL (95th percentile)
Sufficient: ≤900 count/100 mL (90th percentile)
Poor: Sufficient standard not met

A vacuum flask with a sample chiller, an instruction sheet, a return shipping label, some gloves, a sample collection stick and a sample collection tube. Please keep the box that everything arrived in as it's designed to be sent back to us.

Bacteria take a some time to grow. Expect a result within 36 hours of your samples arriving in the lab.

The measurements that we take capture the conditions at a specific a moment in time. This dataset becomes more powerful as we collect more data and start to look at trends. For the most up to date data we allow you to filter for only data from the last 2 months and will introduce finer control as we scale up testing.

We perform testing using ISO and EPA methods, but we are not an ISO 17025 UKAS accredited laboratory (we're working on it!). ISO 17025 accreditation works on the basis of being accredited for a particular test and although other commercial suppliers claim that their tests are being performed in ISO accredited laboratories, we are yet to find a commercial supplier that is offering our tests as ISO 17025 accredited tests. We run all of our tests with controls and standards and you can get in touch with us if you would like to learn more about how we have validated our tests.