Retrofits in Roberts Bay Result in Removal of Nutrient Impairment

EPA’s Clean Water Act Section 319 Program provides funding for restoration of nonpoint source-impaired water bodies. The Agency’s Pollution Prevention and Control website now features success stories for this ongoing challenge. The information below captures one of the program’s more recent successes.

Roberts Bay is in the Sarasota Bay-Peace-Myakka River watershed in northwest Sarasota County, Florida. In 1998, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection included Roberts Bay on the state’s impaired waters list, specifically for exceedances of the historical minimum chlorophyll-a value threshold, a measure of algal biomass. Project partners implemented numerous nonpoint source pollution management strategies, including installing nutrient-separating baffle boxes to contain and separate nutrient rich vegetation, litter, and sediment from stormwater, and promoting the “Florida-friendly landscaping” education program. Chlorophyll-a levels dropped as a result, prompting the state to remove Roberts Bay from the state’s impaired waters list for nutrient impairment in 2010.

For more information on this story, visit: http://water.epa.gov/polwaste/nps/success319/fl_roberts.cfm