Be sure to check out the upcoming talk Dead Zones in the Ocean for timely information about this issue affecting our coastal ecosystems. Details on the lecture at Green Tallahassee Calendar.
Folks at Gulf Restoration Network (GRN) and others have been sounding the alarm for quite a while about the massive dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico.
Recently the GRN and thirteen other conservation groups filed a petition with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency following the announcement of the Gulf of Mexico’s second largest Dead Zone to date, measuring 8,000 square miles!
Researchers who mapped the Dead Zone said it would have been substantially larger if Hurricane Dolly had not passed through, churning up the waters and thus restoring some oxygen to the Zone’s edges. The Gulf Dead Zone, an area of water where oxygen levels are too low for marine life to live, is caused every year by nitrogen and phosphorus pollution flowing into the Gulf from the Mississippi and Atchafalaya Rivers.
The EPA has not taken action to limit pollution in the Mississippi River and Gulf, as required by the federal Clean Water Act. The Dead Zone will continue to grow unless the EPA sets standards for nitrogen and phosphorus pollution and requires all states in the Mississippi River basin meet those standards.See HealthyGulf.org for more information and learn firsthand about how this affects our coast at the FSU Coastal and Marine Lab lecture on August 14.
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