NITROGEN & PHOSPHOROUS ONGOING DAMAGE TO LAKE ERIE

The Woolwich Observer (page 16) published a detailed article titled "Effort to reduce pollution will take years to bear fruit", written by Faisal Ali. Agriculture has long been the elephant in the room when we look at both our local and national sources of ground and surface water pollution. Whether directly from farm runoff of manure or indirectly from herbicides and pesticides used in agriculture, the results are highly damaging. Atrazine and Glyphosate are two well known agricultural herbicides and they are now ubiquitous in our groundwater.

A recent University of Waterloo study indicates a lag time of 30 to 40 years for reductions in agricultural inputs to show up in downstream waterways in the Grand River. Likely improvements in Lake Erie with its algal blooms would take at least as long as well. The algal blooms both in our local reservoirs such as the Woolwich Dam, Conestoga Lake and the Shand Dam (Belwood lake) are primarily from nitrogen and phosphorous enrichment combined with warmer and drier summers overall. These enrichments are also exacerbated by our many local sewage treatment plants, euphemistically called water treatment plants.

"As recently as 2017, the International Joint Commission, a Canadian-U.S. organization that works to protect the shared waterways of both countries, said "The water quality of western and central Lake Erie is unsatisfactory and unacceptable. New mandatory protections should supplement voluntary initiatives to reduce phosphorous loadings.""

Hence both more work, time and money are required to reverse the failings of our authorities (politicians) over the long term.