Microfluidic technology has great potential to fulfil the increasing demand for environmental monitoring. Through the minimisation of reagents, standard solutions and power consumption, compact autonomous instruments have been developed to perform in situ monitoring of remote locations over long deployable lifetimes. The objective of this research is to produce autonomous chemical sensing platforms with a price performance index that creates a significant impact on the existing market. The main focus is on developing a detection platform for ammonium, nitrate and nitrite for water and wastewater using colorimetric techniques. The goal is to integrate polymer actuators valves into the microfluidic chip, to drive down the overall cost.