River protection against the impact of adjacent land use (agricultural runoff such as nutrients and pesticides, fine sediments, cattle trampling, erosion, etc.) through the establishment of fenced riparian buffer stripes, free from any use, where a typical riparian vegetation will grow and provide shade for the river.

Typical river restoration technique. Re-meandering and restoration of the riverbed in order to recreate a new meandering course compliant with the river typology, with a riverbed and riverbanks rich in structures.

The types of measures related to hydromorphology (HY) which are defined in the catalogue of measures of the third river basin management plan, were assigned to the individual water bodies. The objective of this assignation is to identify for each water body those measures that will help to reduce the pressures and deficits present in the water body, thereby improving its status or maintaining its good status. The hydromorphological measures include the restoration of the ecological continuity, the improvement of the riverbed structure as well as the restoration of a near-natural hydrological regime.

Restoration of the ecological continuity for fish, macroinvertebrates, sediments and terrestrial animals by culverts, through its permanent suppression, or through its adaptation in order to reach natural conditions of substrate, depth, flow rate, luminosity and riverbank structure.

Preservation of a corridor for a dynamic river development, where the land is ever not – or extensively used, whose width is compliant with the river typology, which ensures a lateral connection to the alluvial plain, thus creating diversified aquatic and terrestrial habitats.

According to the water framework directive WFD (DIR 2000/60/CE), important physico chemical parameters and river basin specific pollutants are measured in the surface water bodies for the assessment of the ecological status. The modalities for this monitoring are stated in the grand ducal Regulation of 15 January 2016 (règlement grand-ducal du 15 janvier 2016 concernant l'évaluation of the dimension d'eau de surface).

Evaluation of the quality element "hydrological regime" per surface water body

The evaluation of the groundwater bodies is based on the quantitative and the chemical status. The groundwater bodies can be classified as good or as bad.

Evaluation of the quality element "continuity" per surface water body

Macrophytes are a sub-element of the biological quality element (BQE) of the aquatic flora used for the assessment of the ecological status/potential. The assessment is made in 5 classes : high (blue) - good (green) - moderate (yellow) - poor (orange) - bad (red). Macrophytes are particularly sensitive to organic pollution, trophy and hydromorphology.