Continuous water quality monitoring will become a reality on the River Wye at Ross, thanks to a new programme from Ross Rowing Club and local wastewater treatment firm Haigh Environmental.

An innovative device – one of the first of its kind to be deployed in the area – will monitor water quality in the Wye in real time. Supplied by AquaWatch Solutions, the ‘WaQA’ device floats in the river and continuously measures key water health indicators such as turbidity, dissolved oxygen, pH and temperature, feeding the data into an online platform that provides instant analysis.

The project will enable Ross Rowing Club and other local groups to gain a better understanding of their local water quality, at a time where communities have never been more concerned about pollution and river health. Haigh and RRC have committed to sharing the data with Ross Town Council and other local groups, and in time, plan to make the results available to the wider community through a local public page.

This latest project is part of a partnership launched in 2025 at the Ross Regatta, where the two organisations teamed up to raise awareness of the importance of protecting the UK’s waterways from pollution. Haigh Environmental – part of Haigh Group – has been headquartered in Ross-on-Wye since the 1950s, and provides wastewater solutions to customers across the UK, including package-treatment plants – an environmentally friendly alternative to septic tanks. Haigh’s Ross base also manufactures wastewater screens, a crucial component in larger water treatment systems, and waste equipment for the NHS, employing more than 50 people. 

Haigh Environmental Director Luke Shepherd said: “As a company, we are genuinely motivated by the desire to improve water quality in communities across the UK, and particularly here in the beautiful Wye Valley. This buoy brings cutting-edge technology to Ross, helping provide the rowing club and other groups with information about water quality right on their doorstep.”

Haigh Environmental also supported RRC with the installation of a pump station for the club’s main building and campsite in 2022, ensuring the highest quality wastewater treatment for the club’s base. The late Nigel Shepherd and the Shepherd family, who still run Haigh, have been longstanding supporters of the club, and the firm has recently committed to a new sponsorship deal to support the club’s activities.

Ross Rowing Club chair Jonathan Preece said: “Ross Rowing Club has been extremely fortunate to secure sponsorship from Haigh Environmental.  As a growing club, their support will enable us to further develop both our top-level rowing, and right across the board from junior to senior level, in both a competitive and social context. It’s also great to be working with a forward-thinking local company that is striving to improve the quality of our river.”

The buoy and a commemorative boat were launched at an event at Ross Rowing Club attended by Jesse Norman MP, the Mayor of Ross-on-Wye, Cllr Sarah Freer, and over 100 local stakeholders on Friday 19^th June. 

Alongside the deployment of the buoy, Haigh Environmental will work with the club to raise awareness about water quality among its members and wider stakeholders, including at regattas and other events.

Mayor of Ross-on-Wye, Cllr Sarah Freer, said: “The River Wye is integral to the town of Ross-on-Wye; in fact, it’s the reason the town was formed here. We all enjoy the beauty of the river and use it for sport and leisure. We’re lucky that we have one the most easily accessible riverside walks anywhere along the Wye and attract visitors from far and wide to share in its splendour. It’s important to all of us that the river is healthy.”

Abi Croutear-Foy, CEO of AquaWatch Solutions said: “We deploy monitoring points like this one all the time, but the ones that matter most are the ones a community can actually see and use. Continuous monitoring only changes anything if the people who live, row and walk beside a river can understand what it is telling them. We were founded to democratise water quality science, and whilst most of our work is in regulatory and compliance spaces, it’s projects like this where we see the full value of the work we do, and we love it.”