PRACTICAL EXPERIENCES WITH THE BIOLOGICAL EARLY WARNING SYSTEM MOSSELMONITOR

Biological early warning systems (BEWS) for water pollution involve or ganisms as sentinels for the quality of the environment. The organisms are usually fast in their response (minutes) to a multitude of pollut ants. BEWS devices are very useful for continuous monitoring of (indus trial) effluents, water intake, and river or seawater quality control. The ''Mosselmonitor'' is a commercially available BEWS that uses the behavioral valve movement response of freshwater or marine mussels (e. g., Dreissena polymorpha or Mytilus edulis). As an indication of unfav orable conditions in the water, the closure of the shells, or a marked increase in the valve movement frequency, is automatically evaluated. During the last few years the authors have gained practical experienc e with the Mosselmonitor in a number of field experiments. Examples of monitoring practice will be presented that involve the following moni toring situations: intake of drinking water from a river system; conti nuous monitoring of the rivers Rhine and Meuse, partly in combination with other BEWS devices and physicochemical monitoring; monitoring of industrial effluents in a tidal estuary; and control of cooling water chlorination for antifouling purposes. In addition, the system has bee n used for toxicological laboratory studies on selected compounds. (C) 1995 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc.