There have been significant infrastructural developments in Hong Kong since the late 1980s. Further developments are in planning. A significant portion of the land required for the developments come from coastal reclamation. As such, many of the coastal developments affect the flow regime and water quality in the Hong Kong waters. While the impact of individual projects may appear insignificant, the total or cumulative impacts of all the coastal developments may be substantial. To plan against unacceptable environmental impacts, the cumulative effects of the coastal developments needed to be assessed. To this end, the largest water quality modelling and field data collection exercises so far for Hong Kong waters were conducted to assess the cumulative hydrodynamic and water quality impacts resulting from both the historical and the planning coastal developments. The predicted receiving water quality was evaluated against the Water Quality Objectives for each Water Control Zone in the Hong Kong waters. Sensitivity tests were carried out to investigate the response of the receiving water quality to possible variations in the planning coastal developments and the projected pollution loads, and the significance of the Pearl River discharges and local pollution loads.
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