South Korea Monitors Water Quality with Telemetry Systems

South Korea’s Ministry of Environment operates a remote water quality monitoring system, called Tele Monitoring System (TMS), across 1,067 facilities including public wastewater treatment plants and industrial sites. The system continuously measures pollutants discharged by facilities, beginning implementation in 2008 to modernize industrial wastewater management.

These TMS-equipped facilities represent 5.4% of all wastewater treatment and discharge sites nationwide as of 2022 (19,807 total), but account for 96% of the total daily wastewater volume, 22.822 million tons. Analysis from the Ministry shows the TMS system reduced pollutant discharge into public waterways by 33% between 2008 and 2011, with reductions of 39% in biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) and 43% in total phosphorus (TP). Currently, facilities discharging over 2,000 tons of wastewater per day or exceeding discharge standards require TMS installation.