Burden Of Fending Off Blue-Green Algae Falls To States

When it comes to federal funding for algae control, the well is running dry.

States have traditionally relied on grants from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) to educate the public about the dangers of blue-green algae, also known as cyanobacteria. It's a type of algae that can kill animals and make people severely ill.

But in October, the CDC ended a pilot project "that offered funding to 10 states," the Statesman Journal reported. 

In Oregon, the funding amounted to about $150,000 a year, which paid for two employees, travel, and materials, the Associated Press reported. The grant also helped cover the cost of "gathering data for a project to monitor illness from harmful blooms," the AP said. 

State funding will pick up some of the slack. The Health Division in Oregon "will track algae blooms reported by managers of water bodies, such as cities, counties or the U.S. Forest Service. And it will post closures on its website," the Journal said, citing David Farrer, a state official. 

But the division does not have the resources to educate water managers or create signs and brochures to hand out to the public, the Journal said. 

Some states do not monitor harmful algae blooms at all, the article said. "Nationally and in Oregon, there are no standards or regulations governing monitoring for the algae or warning the public," the report said.

“It’s voluntary,” Farrer said in the Journal. “A lot of water bodies in Oregon are not monitored.”

Experts say nutrients play a big factor in the growth of blue-green algae.

Nitrogen and phosphorous from water utilities, discharged wastewater, and faulty septic systems are part of the problem, the AP reported.

This funding hit provides "more reason to tighten the knobs on nutrient inputs into these bloom-sensitive waters," said Hans Paerl, a professor of marine and environmental sciences at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, in the AP piece. 

Hans Pearl, a scientist at University of North Carolina Institute of Marine Sciences, told Public Radio East that reduction of nitrogen and phosphorous in water is the only long-term solution to the blue-green algae problem. 

According to the EPA's most recent National Rivers and Streams assessment, "Forty percent of the nation’s river and stream length has high levels of phosphorus and 28 percent has high levels of nitrogen."

To read more about the "cap and trade" approach to nutrient removal on Water Online, click here.