W2 PM Chesapeake Bay Restoration (Part 2)
Wednesday, 16 November 2005: 1:50 PM - 5:30 PM in Ballroom 2

(BAT-1117-746428) Assessing and Managing the Impacts from Nutrients and Sediments: Chesapeake Bay Lessons Learned.

Batiuk, R¹, ¹ U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Annapolis, Maryland, USA

ABSTRACT- The Chesapeake Bay Program is the unique regional partnership that's been directing and conducting the restoration of the Chesapeake Bay since the signing of the historic Chesapeake Bay Agreement of 1983. The Chesapeake Bay Program partners include the states of Maryland, Pennsylvania and Virginia; the District of Columbia; the Chesapeake Bay Commission, a tri-state legislative body; the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, representing the federal government; and participating scientific, citizen and local government advisory groups. With the adoption of the Chesapeake 2000 Agreement came an unprecedented opportunity to use decades of estuarine research and monitoring data to define restored Chesapeake Bay water quality and establish far reaching nutrient and sediment reduction goals. The resultant Bay specific water quality criteria, dissolved oxygen, water clarity and chlorophyll, along with tidal habitat, defined designated uses have been adopted by Maryland, Virginia, Delaware and the District of Columbia as water quality standards. Using a unique integration of monitoring data and model simulated outputs, caps on nutrient and sediment loads required to achieve the Bay criteria were allocated to 44 sub-basins across the six-state, 64,000 square mile Chesapeake watershed. The critical roles played by estuarine science, resource managers and senior policy officials in deriving these precedent setting criteria and nutrient and sediment loading cap allocations will be illustrated.

Key words: Chesapeake Bay, Nutrients, Sediments, Water quality criteria