Ms Mary Gurrie:

The modelling exercise looks at whole discharge, the abstractions and the discharges, and then we use standards. It is the ecological flow, that is what the lowest flow that will sustain the ecosystem to a satisfactory level is. That is the threshold.

What we use at the moment are the UK and Northern Ireland standards. They are well established and we feel they are appropriate in the Irish context. We look at the whole balance of discharge. With some of the smaller abstractions, because they are more local the abstraction and the discharge happens within a more localised area. It is all taken into consideration, however, as is the cumulative aspect so it looks at the water body, all the abstractions and all the discharges into it to asses their risk.