PUB00111

• Year: 1996
• Title: Layperson's Guide to Water Pollution
• CWCB Section: Interstate & Federal
• Author: California Water Education Foundation
• Description: Layperson's Guide to Water Pollution
• Publications - Doc Type: Other

facilities and implement pollution prevention mea-
sures. The law required compliance by 1992, but
some industries have been slow to comply.

Other federal and state laws fortify the intent
and tools in the CWA. The 1972 Safe Drinking Water
Act set specific limits for contaminants in drinking
water. The 1980 Comprehensive Environmental
Response, Compensation and Liability Act,
Superfund, was created to clean up contaminated
sites, including abandoned mines. And several
federal farm bills have provided incentives for
growers to better manage highly erodable soils.

In 1990, Congress passed the Coastal Zone Act
Reauthorization, in which it declared that runoff is
"a significant factor in coastal water degradation,"
and that "there is a clear link between coastal water
quality and land use activities along the shore."
The amendments required coastal states to
develop plans to control non point pollution to
restore and protect coastal waters. The law
requires states to identify land uses that may
contribute to the degradation of coastal waters
and implement enforceable measures when
necessary to achieve water quality standards.
California officials, in their 1995 plan prepared to
comply with federal law, asserted that existing
nonpoint controls satisfied the federal coasfal act
amendments.

LAKE TAHOE

In an effort to keep Lake Tahoe blue, treated
sewage has been pumped out of the mountain-
ous basin for the last 25 years. Still, the lake
continues to grow murky. The deep blue water of
Lake Tahoe - which sees 2 million visitors
annually - is losing its transparency at a rate of
I 1 foot to 2 feef a year.

The culprits are nitrogen and phosphorus, which
teed algae that are gradually robbing the lake
of its clarity. The Tahoe Research Group from
the University of California, Davis, believes
nutrients are delivered to the lake in a number
of ways. Runoff erodes soils laden with the
nutrients from roads and construction sites on the
basin's steep slopes. The nutrients come from
fertilizers applied to golf courses and land-
scaping, and from nitrogen oxide in automobile
emissions. The nutrients come from air pollution
that eifher settles into the lake or is washed
from the sky by precipitation. And some of the

In addition to the lederal statutes, California's Porter-
Cologne Quality Control Act, passed in 1969,
provides for polluters - both point and nonpoint
sources - to be issued waste discharge require-
ments. The law grants the State Board broad
authority to protect water quality, but also requires
that the economic ramifications of those actions be
considered. Porter.Cologne, for instance, is being
used at Lake Tahoe to regulate individual land
owners in order to curb the sediment pollution that
is flowing into the lake. The Tahoe
Regional Planning Agency also
has police powers that allow it to
fine polluters and use the revenue
to fund research.

The evolution of the law reflects
the controversy - and at times
confusion - over controlling pol-
iuted runoff. A panel of experts
assembled by the State Board
concluded in 1994 that confusion
and ambiguity in the laws and the
nature of point vs. nonpoint pol-
lution had resulted in inconsistent
and ineffective pollution control
efforts.

In Washington, D.C., however,
where the CWA is up for reautho-

pollution percolates into the lake in migrating
groundwater.

While some nutrients would wash down the
hillsides even under natural conditions, much of
the runoff used to percolate through marshes
and meadows before reaching the lake. Those
natural filters have largely been developed into
marinas, housing tracts and golf courses.

The possible solutions include limiting automobile
use in the basin, stricter air pollution controls.
revegetating streams, restoring wetlands, captur-
ing sediment from the worst drainages and
restricting development on the most erodable
soils. But even if the flow of nutrients were halted
tomorrow, the algae might continue to feed for
years off the nutrients that already have reached
the lake. So even under the most aggressive
control measures, the lake will continue to lose
clarity before the trend is reversed.

Eroded soils lrashed into
lakes and streams are often
rich in nitrogen ami
phosphorus. callsin}? algae
blooms. Algae. ill fllm.
reduce.\" the {lillO/ill! of
dissoh'ed oxygen ill the
u'all'r, killing fish.

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