Comparison between the WFD approaches and newly developed water quality model for monitoring transitional and coastal water quality in Northern Ireland

This study aims to evaluate existing approaches for monitoring and assessing water quality in waterbodies in the North of Ireland using newly developed methodologies. The results reveal significant differences between the new technique and the existing "one-out, all-out" approach in rating water quality. The new approach found the water quality status to be "good," "fair," and "marginal," whereas the existing "one-out, all-out" technique classified water quality as "good," and "moderate," respectively. The new technique outperformed existing approaches in rating the water quality of different waterbody types, with high R 2 = 1, NSE = 0.99, and MEF = 0 values. Furthermore, the final assessment of water quality using the new methodologies had the lowest uncertainty (<1 %), whereas the efficiency measures (NSE and MEF) indicate that the new approaches are bias-free to assess water quality at any geographic scale. The results of this study reveal that the newly proposed methodologies are effective in assessing the water quality states of transitional and coastal waterbodies in the North of Ireland. The study also highlighted the limitations of existing approaches and the importance of updating water resource management systems for better protection of these waterbodies. The findings have significant implications for water resource management and planning in the North of Ireland and other similar regions.