Every year, DEQ's Water Division makes available to the public its annual monitoring plan, which summarizes the water quality monitoring activities to be conducted that year. This information is presented in compliance with the Virginia Water Quality Monitoring, Information and Restoration Act to help ensure public awareness of water quality issues and conditions.

The plan is shown in an interactive mapping application which contains detailed information on DEQ’s monitoring activities including the station locations, specific monitoring activities and frequency of monitoring. A station list identifies the location of each station and provides data helpful for other mapping applications.

The monitoring plan is used by DEQ to calculate estimates for laboratory analysis costs for the coming year and to evaluate the standardization of statewide monitoring efforts (e.g., site selection, parameter selection and frequency of sampling). It also provides a convenient source from which to extract descriptive summaries of specific regional and statewide programs based on station locations, parameters sampled, frequencies sampled and the total laboratory costs associated with each. A description of each of monitoring program included in the plan can be found on the Survey Program Codes sheet within the Annual Water Quality Monitoring Plan.

DEQ water monitoring data and more information on this plan is available upon request.