Ric Cooper helps run The Cleddau Project in Pembrokeshire where a group of volunteers are working to restore the county’s main rivers – the Western and Eastern Cleddau – back to good health.
“I live on the estuary and like others had become increasingly distraught with the state of the river,” he said.
“It would often smell of sewage and sometimes slurry, and the life in the river was deteriorating before our eyes.
“We have green algal banks, we have what they can algal mats in the summer months which are due to excess nutrients in the water, sunlight and warm temperatures.”
The condition of the river and marine environment are “very linked”, Mr Cooper explained, but he felt the impact on the coast and sea were “almost like a forgotten story”.
“There hasn’t been the same pressure to improve things for the estuary as there has been for the freshwater Cleddau.”
He said the group, which has spent the last year coordinating a citizen science project monitoring water quality at 49 sites, involving 100 volunteers, was very much looking forward to reading NRW’s reports.
“We want it to be highlighted that this water body is failing, it’s in a bad way and then the powers that be will have to decide what can be done about it.
“We’re hoping this catalyses more action.”