Surface Water Quality Monitoring

Introduction The New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT) is evaluating alternative treatments for road deicing with the goal of reducing the impact of this activity on the State’s water resources. The NYSDOT has requested support from the U. S. Geological Survey (USGS) in monitoring the effects of these alternative treatments on the water resources. In the past, the USGS has cooperat

Problem Harmful algal blooms (HABs) are increasingly a global concern because HABs pose a threat to human and ecosystem health and cause economic damages. HABs are a concern in waterbodies used for drinking-water supply and recreation in New York State. Toxins produced by some species of cyanobacteria (called cyanotoxins) can cause acute and chronic illnesses in humans. Aquatic ecosystem health a

Problem Sediment transport is a serious concern in the upper Esopus Creek watershed. The creek is a well-documented source of sediment and turbidity to the Ashokan Reservoir, which is part of the New York City water supply system. During the last 2 decades there has been a series of stream stabilization and sediment reduction projects completed in the upper Esopus Creek watershed intended to reduc

Problem The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC) intends to develop a Nine-Element Watershed Plan (http://www.dec.ny.gov/chemical/103264.html) for the Lake Erie/Niagara Basin. To develop the Nine-Element Plan, NYSDEC needs a high quality, quality assured, nutrient-loading dataset to serve as a baseline against which future change can be measured and to identify areas i

Background: Harmful algal blooms (HABs) are increasingly a global concern because they pose a threat to human and aquatic ecosystem health and cause economic damages. Cyanobacterial HABs (CyanoHABs) represent a substantial threat to drinking-water supplies, aquatic ecosystem health, and safe recreational uses of freshwater resources in New York. Toxins produced by some species of cyanobacteria

The Long Island Central Pine Barrens (CPB) is a large, preserved region of pristine ecological habitat located in eastern parts of Suffolk County, Long Island, NY. The 106,500-acre CPB encompasses portions of the Towns of Brookhaven, Riverhead, and Southampton, and is a core part of the larger Long Island Pine Barrens Maritime Reserve (fig. 1). The CPB overlies portions of Long Island’s federally...

PROBLEM There are more than 60 organizations and agencies collecting water-quality data on Long Island. The types of database management that are used to store and archive regulatory and non-regulatory data vary from paper forms to spreadsheets to State and Federal databases, and there is minimal communication between these systems. As a result, those interested in analyzing data may be unaware

• National Water Information System (NWIS): Find water-resources data collected at approximately 1.5 million sites, using menu-based and map-based front ends. • WaterWatch: View maps, graphs, and tables describing real-time, recent, and past streamflow conditions for the United States.

Background In order to help identify sources of high Enterococci concentrations identified by the Village of East Hampton and the Surfrider Foundation’s water-quality sampling upstream of Hook Pond, surface water and groundwater samples will be collected and analyzed for F+-specific coliphage, bacteroides, Enterococci and fecal coliform, and nitrogen isotopes. Potential sources of pathogens incl

PROBLEM Hook Pond, an 83-acre freshwater pond in East Hampton, N.Y., has historically shown indications of impaired water quality. Impairments in this shallow pond include elevated nutrient concentrations and low dissolved oxygen concentrations in bottom waters as a result of current and historical land-use practices (Lombardo, 2015). Recent (2016) harmful algal blooms in Hook Pond and other east

Elevated levels of nutrients (for example, phosphorus) in the Mohawk River can lead to eutrophication and potentially toxic blue-green algal blooms. The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), in cooperation with the New York Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC) collected nutrient samples and measured streamflow in the Mohawk River. These data are being used to develop a water-quality model...

Problem Suspended-sediment concentration (SSC) and turbidity are primary water-quality concerns in New York City’s (NYC) water-supply system (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 2007). In the NYC water-supply system turbidity is largely caused by clay and silt rather than organic material (Effler et al. 1998, Peng et al. 2002, 2004). Sediment can originate from the watershed land surface and the