Exceptional weather in the midlands, UK, during 1988-1990 results in the rapid acidification of an upland stream

Numerous catchment studies have identified the control exerted by hydrological processes on short-term (within a year) fluctuations in surface water acidity. Because discharge is, in turn, a function of broad climate parameters, there has been growing interest in the potential impact of changing precipitation and temperature regimes on water chemistry. The exceptionally warm and arid period 1988-1990 provided an opportunity to investigate the response of an acidic catchment in the East Midlands to an extreme climate scenario. The results obtained from three years of intensive monitoring indicated that between 1988 and 1990 there was a fourfold increase of the surface-water acidity at several observation sites within the Beacon catchment, Charnwood Forest, Leicestershire. As well as providing an indication of currently extreme hydrochemical conditions which in the near future may become the norm, these observations also have a bearing on the validity of long-term predictions derived from process-orientated models.