Nutrients in the Nation's Waters--Too Much of a Good Thing?

Abstract

The mission of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) is to assess the quantity and quality of the earth resources of the Nation and to provide information that will assist resource managers and policymakers at Federal, State, and local levels in making sound decisions. Assessment of water-quality conditions and trends is an important part of this overall mission. One of the greatest challenges faced by water-resources scientists is acquiring reliable information that will guide the use and protection of the Nation's water resources. That challenge is being addressed by Federal, State, interstate, and local water-resource agencies and by many academic institutions. These organizations are collecting water-quality data for a host of purposes that include: compliance with permits and water-supply standards; development of remediation plans for a specific contamination problem; operational decisions on industrial, waste water, or water-supply facilities; and research on factors that affect water quality. An additional need for water-quality information is to provide a basis on which regional and national policy decisions can be based. Wise decisions require sound information. As a society we need to know whether certain types of waterquality problems are isolated or ubiquitous, whether there are significant differences in conditions among regions, whether the conditions are changing over time, and why these conditions change from place to place and over time. The information can be used to help determine the efficacy of existing water-quality policies and to help analysts determine the need for and likely consequences of new policies. To address these needs, the Congress appropriated funds in 1986 for the USGS to begin a pilot program in seven project areas to develop and refine the National Water-Quality Assessment (NAWQA) Program. In 1991, the USGS began full implementation of the program. The NAWQA Program builds upon an existing base of water-quality studies of the USGS, as well as those of other Federal, State, and local agencies. The objectives of the NAWQA Program are to: Describe current water-quality conditions for a large part of the Nation's freshwater streams, rivers, and aquifers Describe how water quality is changing over time Improve understanding of the primary natural and human factors that affect water-quality conditions This information will help support the development and evaluation of management, regulatory, and monitoring decisions by other Federal, State, and local agencies to protect, use, and enhance water resources. The goals of the NAWQA Program are being achieved through ongoing and proposed investigations of 60 of the Nation's important river basins and aquifer systems, which are referred to as study units. These study units are distributed throughout the Nation and cover a diversity of hydrogeologic settings. More than two-thirds of the Nation's freshwater use occurs within the 60 study units, and more than two-thirds of the people served by public water-supply systems live within their bou...

Health and Habitat Quality Assessment for the Eastern Hellbender (Cryptobranchus Alleganiensis Alleganiensis) in Indiana, Usa

“…All physical parameters we measured were well suited for aquatic life. Standard levels for orthophosphate in streams do not exist; however, the US Geological Survey (USGS) recommends levels of total phosphates be below 0.1 mg/l (Mueller and Helsel, 1999). Orthophosphate levels in our study were slightly higher than the recommended 0.1 mg/l of total phosphate by the USGS.…”

VOCs, Pesticides, Nitrate, and Their Mixtures in Groundwater Used for Drinking Water in the United States

“…In North America, nitrate is an ubiquitous compound in groundwater with variable background concentrations (22)(23)(24). Previous regional and national investigations have defined background nitrate concentrations from less than 1 to 3 mg/L (22)(23)(24). For the purpose of this national-scale analysis, nitrate concentrations of g3 mg/L were assumed to have anthropogenic sources (and treated as "detections"), which is consistent with several earlier studies (21,23,25).…”

Probability of Nitrate Contamination of Recently Recharged Groundwaters in the Conterminous United States

“…In another study, nitrate concentrations of 4 mg/L or more in water from community wells in Nebraska increased the risk of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (10). Shallow groundwater unaffected by human activities commonly contains less than 2 mg/L of nitrate (11).…”