Sierrans, Colleagues: I thought you would want to know of the below article, forwarded to me by SF Office Sierra Club. Lyle ___________________________________________ Lyle Krewson 6403 Aurora Avenue #3 Des Moines, IA 50322-2862 ____________________________________________ ------ Forwarded Message From: [log in to unmask] Date: Mon, 30 Jul 2001 09:50:58 -0700 To: [log in to unmask] Subject: IA role in gulf dead zone Copyright 2001 The Times-Picayune Publishing Company The Times-Picayune (New Orleans) July 28, 2001 Saturday SECTION: METRO; Pg. 6 HEADLINE: Dead zone spreads out As unfortunate and selfish as it is, the people of Iowa are proof that sometimes people don't become concerned about fixing a problem until it affects them personally. Last year, a national task force drafting a plan to decrease the size of the "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico asked agricultural officials in the Midwest to help reduce by 30 percent the amount of nitrates flowing into the Mississippi River and its tributaries. The excess nitrogen that the Mississippi River empties into the Gulf causes algae to flourish. When that algae dies and decomposes, the decomposition depletes oxygen in the water and makes it impossible for other organisms to survive. Heavy use of fertilizer is believed to account for 65 percent of the nitrates that flow into the water. Because of that, the task force was preparing last year to ask the states in the Mississippi River basin to try to make the 30 percent reduction in the amount of nitrogen that ends up in the water. However, the delegates from Illinois and Iowa said that setting the numeric goal -- even though voluntary -- would require too much of the farmers in their states. Louisianians certainly don't want farmers upstream to suffer, but the refusal of officials in those states to recognize how their actions adversely affect the livelihood of fishers, shrimpers and crabbers in this state was troubling. What happens in Louisiana didn't seem to excite them very much. Iowans found out in May that excess nitrogen can cause them problems, too. In Des Moines, officials with the city's Water Works department recorded the highest-ever nitrate level in the Raccoon River, the source of the city's drinking water. Federal guidelines say that the water is safe as long as the level of nitrates doesn't reach 10 parts per million. The nitrates were registering at 17.5 parts per million in May, forcing Des Moines to switch to the Des Moines River for its drinking water. Consistent with the record levels of nitrogen Iowa officials found in their water, a Louisiana researcher recently concluded that the dead zone in the Gulf is as large as it has ever been, at least 8,006 square miles, stretching from the Mississippi River to an area west of Sabine Pass in Texas. That's an area at least as large as the state of Massachusetts. Nancy Rabalais, a researcher with the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium, said the zone might be even larger, but she was unable to continue traveling west along the Texas coast because of time constraints. Environmentalists here have been preaching for years that shrinking the size of the dead zone will require regional and national cooperation. Perhaps now the folks upstream will be more eager to work with us. Des Moines' Water Works manager told the Des Moines Register newspaper that "somebody needs to really sit down and look at the data and say, 'What is this telling us?' " Somebody already has. It's clear that the data communicate the same thing scientists here have been saying for a while: the amount of nitrogen that makes it to the nation's rivers and streams needs to be reduced. Now that some folks in Iowa recognize that reducing the amount of nitrogen can help them up there, they ought to be more willing to help us down here. Melanie Shepherdson Flynn Project Attorney, Clean Water Project NRDC 1200 New York Avenue, NW Suite 400 Washington, DC 20005 phone: (202) 289-2393 fax: (202) 289-1060 Clean Water Network listserves are for CWN members only and messages are intended solely for those environmental activists. ------ End of Forwarded Message - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - For SC email list T-and-C, send: GET TERMS-AND-CONDITIONS.CURRENT to [log in to unmask]