Bureau of Water

EXCESS NUTRIENTS: A HIGH PROFILE WATER QUALITY ISSUE

The impact of excess nitrogen and phosphorus in rivers, lakes, streams and the Gulf of Mexico has become a very high profile water quality issue. Under the right conditions, nutrients can cause excessive algal blooms, low oxygen and nuisance conditions that adversely impact aquatic life, drinking water and recreational uses of the water. The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency has identified many waterbodies in the state with these problems.

Nitrogen and phosphorus come from municipal wastewater treatment, urban stormwater, row crop agriculture, livestock production, industrial wastewater and combustion of fossil fuels. In other words, most aspects of modern society contribute to this pollution problem. The proportion of loading to a particular waterbody from these sources varies from watershed to watershed, with point sources and urban stormwater being most important in urbanized watersheds and row crop and/or livestock production being predominant contributors in agricultural watersheds.

Current Management Approaches and Issues

• The Clean Water Act framework requires: the establishment of water quality standards that protect aquatic life and/or other beneficial uses of the water; monitoring and assessment to determine attainment of standards; listing of waters not attaining and development of Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDL) to limit pollution to those waterbodies.
• TMDL load limits are required to be implemented through National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permits, which address point sources—municipal or industrial wastewater dischargers. Management of non-point source pollution is through voluntary implementation of best management practices (BMP), so there is no guarantee that TMDL load limits allocated to non-point sources will be achieved.
• Cost-share incentives to implement/install BMPs include federal Conservation Reserve Program and state Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program, state Partners in Conservation Program, various Farm Bill conservation programs and Section 319 non-point source management grants. The federal Farm Bill programs, though relatively well-funded, are not consistently targeted at water quality improvement, nutrient reduction or locations most in need of BMPs.
• There are various other efforts through state farm groups, industry and non-profit organizations to promote the use of agricultural BMPs, but these efforts are not consistently coordinated nor targeted to particular watersheds. In addition, the degree of implementation of key nutrient-related BMPs is not comprehensively quantified or mapped, so the collective status of BMP implementation in the state is unknown.
• Available data do indicate that Illinois producers are not over-applying fertilizers or manure and that the traditional suite of conservation practices will not be adequate to achieve such large reductions. Absent the development of an economically viable third crop such as a perennial for biofuels, the costs to significantly reduce nutrient losses from agriculture could be billions of dollars.
• New and expanding municipal wastewater treatment plants are required by Illinois Pollution Control Board regulation to limit phosphorus in their discharges. However, plants currently implementing this requirement represent only 6.5 percent of municipal dischargers. The collective cost of implementing nutrient removal at all municipal wastewater treatment plants to meet stringent water quality standards would be huge. Especially problematic would be treatment installation at smaller facilities.

What U.S. EPA Expects

U.S. EPA expects states to establish numeric water quality standards for phosphorus and nitrogen and to carry out the other pieces of the Clean Water Act framework, as appropriate. U.S. EPA’s Inspector General issued a finding in 2009 that U.S. EPA had not done enough to get state numeric nutrient water quality standards established. In response, U.S. EPA has developed a “corrective action plan” which includes a commitment to identify states where federal promulgation of nutrient water quality standards is required. U.S. EPA has been petitioned and sued by various environmental groups for failure of states to establish numeric nutrient standards, so there is mounting pressure on U.S. EPA and states to address nutrients by developing numeric nutrient water quality standards.

States have concerns on the issue of numeric nutrient water quality standards. They raise two main points:

1. There is not a straightforward relationship between nutrient concentration in the water and adverse effects, so a statewide “one size fits all” standard that meets the test of scientific defensibility is almost unachievable; and
2. The Clean Water Act programs are effective for point sources but do not assure reductions from non-point sources that are often the predominant contributors of nutrients in a particular watershed.

Objectives for the Nutrient Summit and Beyond

A Nutrient Summit was held on September 13-14, 2010, at the University of Illinois-Springfield. Invitees included over 250 people representing government, environmental groups, municipal and industrial wastewater dischargers, agricultural groups, academia, non-governmental organizations, and consulting firms with an interest in the topic of nutrient pollution. The intent of the Summit was to present factual information as well as various stakeholder perspectives so that all attendees could hear the same information at the same time and ask clarifying questions, rather than debating potential solutions.

On October 14, 2010, a Nutrient Policy Roundtable will be convened by a small number of stakeholder representatives—policy leaders from government, agriculture, municipal/industrial dischargers, environmental groups, and technical assistance providers/researchers. The intent of the Policy Roundtable is to begin identifying an action plan with short and longer term actions to address nutrients in Illinois, as they impact in-state waters as well as the Gulf of Mexico. This is the beginning of what we hope is a collaborative, problem-solving process that will require discussion and involvement beyond just the Summit attendees, and will eventually affect stakeholders in all sectors. The goal is to affect a state plan to get nutrient reductions from all sources that includes accountability by all.

• Nutrient Summit Agenda and Presentations
• Additional Information about Nutrients
• Attendee List

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