Das Projekt "AgrEauAlp: Agri-Environmental Measures and Water Quality in Mountain Catchments^Influence des Pratiques Agricoles sur les eaux Souterraines en Regions de Montagne (FRA)" wird vom Umweltbundesamt gefördert und von Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne, Institut de Sols, Roches et Fondations, Laboratoire de Geologie durchgeführt. This european programme focuses on the problem of water quality and water resources in mountain regions. The basic aim of the programme is to detect and describe the interactions between agricultural practices/grazing and water quality in mountains. Socio-economists, biologists, hydrologists, hydrogeologists and soil scientists from Austria, France, and Switzerland get together to: - analyse water circulation in the whole system, from the surface (land use practices, runoff waters), through the ground, to the water bodies; - determine the interactions between pollutions and land use practices; - evaluate and validate the agri-environmental measures; - propose new agri-environmental measures. The most important risk for drinking water safety in mountain regions is liquid manure management. Pollutions made by pasture in the catchment area are diffuse and most of the time not dangerous even if seasonal changes are clearly detectable. Some bacteriological analyses will be done in order to detect the presence of pathogenic germs in these cases of minor pollution. We will also compare their persistance in karstic and in quarternary aquifers with those of faecal indicators. Serious pollutions result from liquid manure storage, handling and spreading. A part of the study will consist in a study of the liquid manure balance in order to determine some possible modifications in the whole cycle to decrease the pollution risk. New practices have to be tested to see their environmental impact. The aim of the most important part of the swiss study is to determine the persistance of pathogenic germs in groundwater as a function of the aquifer and its hydrogeological, physical and chemical properties. We would like to test the faecal indicators usually used to know if their survival is really better than pathogens in the groundwater of karstic aquifers. The basic Swiss group network includes three mountain springs coupled with three rivers and a little lake. The Brassus spring is situated in the Jura Vaudois mountains, whereas Clos Ister and Confluent InfZrieur are in the PrZalpes Vaudoises. The choice was focused on these springs, because they had already known varius cases of pollution. The Brassus spring supplies several villages of the commune of the Chenit in water. During the different cases of pollution in 1989 and 1991, it had been abandoned, depriving several thousands of inhabitants of the VallZe de Joux of drinkable water.
Das Projekt "Nitrat und Landwirtschaft im Klettgau" wird vom Umweltbundesamt gefördert und von Forschungsinstitut für Biologischen Landbau durchgeführt. Anhand von kleinen Lysimetern (verschiedene Bodentiefe) handelt sich in einem geographisch abgegrenzten Gebiet um: - das Nitratauswaschungspotential verschiedener landwirtschaftlichen Zonen oder Bewirtschaftungstype zu bestimmen - die Grundlagen einer Prognose der Nitratfracht fuer die naechsten Jahre zu erarbeiten - das Nitratauswaschungspotential und dessen Beeinflussbarkeit durch bestimmte Anbauweisen zu messen - einen Landwirtschaftsplan zu erarbeiten um die Nitratfracht so niedrig wie moeglich zu halten Die Resultate dieser Nitratuntersuchung bleiben bei diesem Vorgehen nicht isoliert, sondern koennen als konkrete Vorschlaege Eingang in einen groesseren Zusammenhang agraroekologischer Modelle finden.