Iowa Department of Natural Resources
Environmental Services Division

For Immediate Release                                                 
January 19, 2007

TECHNICAL COMMITTEE ON LAKE NUTRIENTS TO MEET JANUARY 26 IN AMES

MEDIA CONTACT: Jack Riessen at (515) 281-5089

AMES -- The Lake Nutrient Standards Technical Advisory Committee will
meet at 9:30 a.m. on January 26 in Ames.  The committee meeting will be
held in Room 240 of Bessey Hall on the Iowa State University campus.

The Technical Advisory Committee was formed to provide scientific input
on establishing nutrient standards for Iowa lakes.  This information
will be provided to the Environmental Protection Commission and will be
considered by commissioners in establishing nutrient standards for
lakes. 

Technical issues scheduled for discussion and input at the upcoming
meeting include the relationship between nutrients and fish assemblages,
the prevalence of cyanobacteria, the levels of nutrient reduction that
are reasonably attainable, nitrate toxicity to aquatic organisms and
nitrogen limitation in lakes with high phosphorus levels.

The agenda follows:

1. Introduction and preliminaries
2. Recap of previous discussion and consensus items
3. Discussion of technical issues (fish data, cyanobacteria,
attainability, nitrate toxicity and nitrogen limitation)
4. Open discussion
5. Concluding remarks, future meetings and actions

The meeting is open to the public for observation.  The DNR will accept
public comments at a later date when lake nutrient standards are
proposed by the Environmental Protection Commission.
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