Indicator Fact Sheet

Chlorophyll-a in transitional, coastal and marine waters

Indicator Fact Sheet

Prod-ID: IND-18-en

Also known as: WEU 013

This is an old version, kept for reference only.

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Topics: Water and marine environment

This page was archived on 03 Mar 2015 with reason: Other (New version data-and-maps/indicators/chlorophyll-in-transitional-coastal-and-2/assessment was published)

Assessment made on 01 Aug 2003

Generic metadata

Classification

Topics:

Water and marine environment

DPSIR: Driving force

Identification

Indicator codes

WEU 013

Contents

Policy issue: Effects of nutrient load reductions on coastal concentrations of phytoplankton

Figures

Trends in average summer chlorophyll-a concentrations in Europe's Seas

Key assessment

No general trend is observed in summer surface chlorophyll-a concentrations either in the Baltic Sea area, Greater North Sea or coastal waters of Greece. The majority of locations show no trend. A few locations in Danish estuaries and the Danish North Sea show a decreasing trend, whilst a few locations in Belgian, Finnish, Lithuanian and Swedish coastal waters show an increasing trend. No trend is observed in the Dutch coastal waters, which receive high nutrient inputs from the Rhine river basin, nor in Norwegian and Greek coastal waters. Finland reports that the increasing trend of chlorophyll-a in the eastern Gulf of Finland and in the Archipelago Sea is due to increase in phosphorus released from hypoxic/anoxic sediments (Kauppila and Bäck, 2001; Hänninen et al., 2000).