Ecology & Safety, Volume 15, 2021

Streszczenie: This paper presents the evaluation of the ecological status of the Tulcea-Sulina Channel in the Danube Delta, using the water quality index (WQI) and some important monitoring points where the Danube is discharged in the Black Sea, respectively where the river is splitting into 3 arms. The Sulina Chanel is a navigable channel for heavy ships and, in the same time, represents a source of local drinking water, while keeping specific features of unique biodiversity in Europe. Besides the navigation, other anthropogenic activities are present (e.g. agricultural and fish farms, tourism and fish poaching), which frequently involve discharges (e.g. detergents, domestic waste, agricultural fertilizer, animal manure, oil products) in the Sulina Channel. These inputs are responsible for the enrichment of the water with nutrients (e.g. nitrogen and phosphorus based) and organic substances that contribute to the growth of algae and other aquatic plants and ultimately to the water eutrophication, fact recognized as a major environmental issue for the management of water resources. This paper tackles the issue of general information on the Danube River, Danube Delta and historical information on water quality along the river. It describes the water quality monitoring procedure, as well as the main activities necessary to successfully carry out the water quality monitoring process, in the light of European legislation on water quality monitoring, focusing on The Water Framework Directive (WFD) and the Drinking Water Directive (DWD) of the European Union (EU). A series of aspects related to the water quality monitoring network in the Danube basin were detailed, followed by a list and description of quality indicators that were monitored in this study in order to calculate the value for the Water Quality Index (WQI) further used to estimate the water quality status and respectively to establish the possible uses of the available water resources along the Tulcea-Sulina Channel.