Assessment of Ecological State of Surface Waters in ARROW Project: Robust Multivariate Predictive Models

The ARROW (www.cba.muni.cz/arrow/eng - Assessment and Reference Reports of Water monitoring) project is the project of implementation of EU Water Framework Directive in the monitoring of surface waters of the Czech Republic and covers all aspects of this problem from data sampling to informatics solution (focusing on the ecostat). The project is based on long term development of this field in the Czech Republic and it is carried out under the supervision of the Ministry of the Environment of the CR. The important part of the ARROW project is the development and implementation of a Czech approach to the evaluation of the ecological state of surface waters using an analysis of monitoring data. The main idea of the system is an approach based on a network of reference sites and robust multivariate modeling of expected environmental and biological conditions (could be called “RIVPACS type”). The approach presented is compatible with the EU WFD and will be implemented in the national-wide information system of the ecological state of surface waters of the CR. The evaluation of ecological state in ARROW project is based on two former projects; the direct predecessor is TRITON project aimed on analysis of biomonitoring data from small watercourses under collaboration with Agricultural Water Management Authority of the Czech Republic which has been developed since 1999. The other source of inspiration and especially reference dataset is also PERLA system which should be considered as a scientific background for biomonitoring activities in the CR. The methodology is flexible and robust and could be adopted for different types of data and biological communities. All levels of the process are covered by objective statistical methodology and monitored by experts; their computations are based on robust multivariate and multimetric methods, some of them newly developed.