Could the Mississippi River benefit from Chesapeake Bay’s strategy to improve water quality?

June 21, 2024 — As environmental groups and policy analysts in the Mississippi River basin seek solutions to shrink a massive “dead zone” that forms off the coast of Louisiana each year, they have looked to a regional cleanup program in the Chesapeake Bay as a model.

A key component of that effort, known as the Chesapeake Bay Program, is regulation.

For nearly 15 years, it’s included a legally enforceable, multistate pollution quota — one of a select few in the nation. This “total maximum daily load” aims to reduce the amount of nutrients, like phosphorus and nitrogen, that run off into the Bay’s waters.

Too much of chemicals that derive from these elements, commonly used to grow crops and fertilize lawns, can cause algae blooms and die-offs that rob waters of oxygen and suffocate aquatic life.

But the Bay program’s scientific advisers recently noted the strategy is imperfect.

After two missed deadlines to reduce nutrient runoff, and a third looming, mid-Atlantic state and federal officials are reevaluating their options.

Read the full article at The Gazette