Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is the current state of the monitoring in the United Kingdom of the industrial chemicals present in groundwater and river water, in particular pseudo-oestrogens (xenoestrogens) and those substances itemised in Directive 2008/105/EC.

In England, the Environment Agency has an extensive monitoring network over both surface and groundwaters, to comply with European groundwater legislation (2006/118/EC) and requirements under the EU Priority Substances Directive (2008/105/EC and its update, 2013/39/EU). It monitors surface waters for priority substances (set at EU level), and also certain other chemicals of a national, but not European, concern.

The Environment Agency are developing a programme to monitor priority substances that accumulate in biota (e.g. in fish or shellfish) at a number of freshwater sites in England.

The Environment Agency is shortly to start contributing to the European-wide surveillance of a number of emerging substances of concern (the watch list) required under Directive 2013/39/EU. This monitoring will include the xenoestrogen ethinyloestradiol.