Achieving Water Quality Goals in the Chesapeake Bay: A Comprehensive Evaluation of System Response (CESR)
This report evaluates why progress toward the Chesapeake Bay Total Maximum Daily Load and water quality standards has been slower than expected and offers options for how progress can be accelerated.
Description
Evidence indicates that current efforts to reduce nutrient loads will not meet the targets of the Chesapeake Bay Total Maximum Daily Load, or Bay TMDL. In addition, the Chesapeake Bay Program's ambient water quality monitoring program indicates that estuary water quality has been slow to respond to realized nutrient and sediment reductions in many regions of the Bay. This report summarizes the Scientific and Technical Advisory Committee's evaluation of why progress toward meeting the Bay TMDL and water quality standards has been slower than expected and offers options for how progress can be accelerated. Three overarching conclusions emerged from these evaluations. First, achieving pollutant reduction and water quality improvements is proving more challenging than expected. Second, the Bay system faces permanent and ongoing changes in land use, climate change, population growth and economic development that will challenge notions of restoration based on recreating historical conditions. Third, opportunities to meet these challenges exist but efforts require changes and new approaches to implementation, planning and decision-making.
The following materials have been published alongside the CESR report:
CESR Resource Document: Watershed
CESR Resource Document: Estuary
CESR Resource Document: Living Resources
Learn more on the STAC webpage.
Category: Report