Terence Flanagan (Dublin North East, Independent)
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733. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government his views on concerns regarding the quality of water in Dublin Bay; the measures his Department is taking to improve its quality; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [29716/15]

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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Assessments of the water quality in Dublin have taken place since the 1990s and improvements in the quality of the waters of the Bay and its estuaries have been noted over the past two decades. Currently the quality of the water and the water environment in Dublin Bay is monitored under the Water Framework Directive Monitoring programme which commenced in 2006. Monitoring is undertaken by the EPA for general water quality parameters and biological quality is monitored by the EPA, Marine Institute and Inland Fisheries Ireland. The current status classification of Dublin Bay taking all elements into consideration is good. Some issues do exist in the estuaries of the Liffey and Tolka and these estuaries are currently classified as being at moderate status with some effects of elevated nutrients being found. Research into the causes of occasional accumulations of seaweed blooms within the Bay has been included in the EPA’s research call for 2015. The four identified bathing waters in the Dublin Bay area are monitored and managed under the requirements of the 2008 Bathing Water Quality Regulations by the relevant local authorities, namely Dollymount Strand, Merrion Strand, Sandymount Strand and Seapoint. The EPA assessed the monitoring results for these bathing waters for the period 2011 – 2014 and determined the bathing waters to have the following classification in 2014: Seapoint – Excellent water quality status, Dollymount Strand – Good water quality status, Merrion Strand – Sufficient water quality status, and Sandymount Strand - Good water quality status.

Throughout the bathing season, the local authorities report their bathing water monitoring results to the EPA and this information is published and made available to the public on the national bathing water website (splash.epa.ie). During the bathing season where any incidents arise at these identified bathing waters the local authorities report the incidents to the EPA using a notification system which automatically reports incident information, including actions undertaken to protect bathers, and dissemination of this information to the public is undertaken via the Splash website and via social media through the @EPABathingWater twitter account.

During the 2015 bathing season to date, four incidents have arisen where faecal contamination was detected at the Dublin City Council bathing waters (2 incidents at Merrion Strand, 1 incident at Dollymount Strand and 1 at Sandymount Strand). Given the very complex and many inputs into the Dublin Bay area, Dublin City are currently undertaking a Microbial Source Tracking study at their bathing waters to identify the origin of contamination.

The EPA issued a Waste Water Discharge Licence (D0034-01) on 27 July 2010 for the Greater Dublin Agglomeration (Ringsend). The licence requires works to be undertaken to improve the quality of discharges from the agglomeration to ensure that appropriate protection is afforded to the receiving water environment.

Since 1 January 2014 Irish Water has statutory responsibility for all aspects of water services planning, delivery and operation at national, regional and local levels for public water services including the delivery of water services capital infrastructure. The expansion and upgrading of the Ringsend Wastewater Treatment Plant is an urgent priority for Irish Water and a scheme to achieve this is currently being evaluated in partnership with Dublin City Council. Irish Water has established a dedicated team to deal with representations and queries from public representatives. The team can be contacted via email to oireachtasmembers@water.ie or by telephone on a dedicated number, 1890 578 578.