Abstract
Nancy Rabalais has spent her life sounding the alarm bells about the massive dead zone at the mouth of the Mississippi River. Every year, she and her team of researchers at Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium measure areas of low oxygen that are suffocating plant and marine life in the Gulf of Mexico, issuing a press release about the changes they observe. Since she began monitoring the dead zone in 1985, it has more than doubled to 6,700 square miles—an area larger than Connecticut.
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Notes
- 1.
Megan Scudellari, “Coastal Command,” The Scientist, September 1, 2013, http://www.the-scientist.com/?articles.view/articleNo/37163/title/Coastal-Command/.
- 2.
Paul Greenberg, “A River Runs through It,” The American Prospect, May 22, 2013, http://prospect.org/article/river-runs-through-it.
- 3.
Carol Kaesuk Yoon, “A ‘Dead Zone’ Grows in the Mississippi,” The New York Times, January 20, 1998, http://www.nytimes.com/1998/01/20/science/a-dead-zone-grows-in-the-gulf-of-mexico.html.
- 4.
“Blooming Horrible: Nutrient Pollution Is a Growing Problem All along the Mississippi,” The Economist, June 23, 2012, http://www.economist.com/node/21557365.
- 5.
Nancy Rabalais, “We All Live Downstream (and Upstream),” Journal of Soil and Water Conservation, 58, No. 3 (May/June 2003), http://www.jswconline.org/content/58/3/52A.extract.
- 6.
The Nature Conservancy, “America’s Great Watershed Initiative,” http://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/habitats/riverslakes/programs/great-rivers-partnership/americas-great-watershed-initiative-fact-sheet.pdf.
- 7.
Hamline University Center for Global Environmental Education, “Mississippi River Facts & Links,” http://cgee.hamline.edu/rivers/resources/river_days/info.html.
- 8.
National Park Service, “Mississippi River Facts,” http://www.nps.gov/miss/riverfacts.htm.
- 9.
Brian Clark Howard, “Mississippi Basin Water Quality Declining despite Conservation,” National Geographic, April 11, 2014, http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/04/140411-water-quality-nutrients-pesticides-dead-zones-science/.
- 10.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, “Nitrogen and Phosphorus Pollution in the Mississippi River Basin: Findings of the Wadeable Streams Assessment,” http://water.epa.gov/type/rsl/monitoring/upload/EPA-MARB-Fact-Sheet-112911_508.pdf.
- 11.
Howard, “Mississippi Basin Water Quality Declining despite Conservation.”
- 12.
Brooke Barton and Sarah Elizabeth Clarke, Water & Climate Risks Facing U.S. Corn Production: How Companies & Investors Can Cultivate Sustainability, Ceres, June 2014, pp. 45–47, https://www.ceres.org/resources/reports/water-and-climate-risks-facing-u.s.-corn-production-how-companies-and-investors-can-cultivate-sustainability/view.
- 13.
“The Mississippi River and the Making of a Dead Zone,” Prospect.org, http://prospect.org/sites/default/files/mississippi-river-web-version.gif.
- 14.
Karl Mathiesen, “Do Dams Destroy Rivers?” The Guardian, August 27, 2014, http://www.theguardian.com/environment/live/2014/aug/27/do-dams-destroy-rivers.
- 15.
Eileen Fretz Shader, “Flood Risk Rising on the Mississippi River?” American Rivers, February 14, 2014, http://www.americanrivers.org/blog/flood-risk-rising-mississippi-river/#sthash.HqfdzbYG.dpuf.
- 16.
The Nature Conservancy, “The Mississippi River and Its Floodplain,” http://www.nature.org/ourinitiatives/habitats/riverslakes/explore/mississippi-river-and-its-floodplain-restoring-connections-for-people-and.xml.
- 17.
William J. Mitsch, John W. Day Jr., J. Wendell Gilliam, et al., “Reducing Nitrogen Loading to the Gulf of Mexico from the Mississippi River Basin: Strategies to Counter a Persistent Ecological Problem,” Bioscience 51, no. 5 (2001), pp. 373–388, http://bioscience.oxfordjournals.org/content/51/5/373.full.pdf+htm.
- 18.
Barton and Clarke, Water & Climate Risks Facing U.S. Corn Production, p. 32.
- 19.
Sally Deneen, “Raiding the Bread Basket: Use and Abuse of the Mississippi River Basin,” National Geographic, January 23, 2012, http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/01/120123-mississippi-river-basin/.
- 20.
The University of British Columbia, “U.S. Rush to Produce Corn-Based Ethanol Will Worsen ‘Dead Zone’ in Gulf of Mexico: UBC Study,” March 10, 2008, http://news.ubc.ca/2008/03/10/archive-media-releases-2008-mr-08-025/.
- 21.
Patrick J. Kiger, “North Dakota’s Salty Fracked Wells Drink More Water to Keep Oil Flowing,” National Geographic, November 11, 2013, http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/energy/2013/11/131111-north-dakota-wells-maintenance-water/.
- 22.
Dan Bacher, “Water for Fracking: How Much Does the Oil/Gas Industry Use?” Daily Kos, March 23, 2013, http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/03/23/1196415/-Water-for-fracking-8-acre-feet-6-721-acre-feet-or-much-much-more.
- 23.
Bill Chameides, “Fracking Water: It’s Just So Hard to Clean,” National Geographic, October 4, 2013, http://energyblog.nationalgeographic.com/2013/10/04/fracking-water-its-just-so-hard-to-clean/.
- 24.
Marcus Griswold, “Fracking in the Bakken Threatens Missouri River Watershed Health,” National Resources Defense Council Staff Blog, April 9, 2014, http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/mgriswold/fracking_in_the_bakken_continu.html.
- 25.
U.S. General Accounting Office, Oil and Gas Transportation: Department of Transportation Is Taking Actions to Address Rail Safety, but Additional Actions Needed to Improve Pipeline Safety, August 2014, p. 16, http://www.gao.gov/assets/670/665404.pdf.
- 26.
Alan Bjerga, “Drought-Parched Mississippi River Is Halting Barges,” Bloomberg, November 27, 2012, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-11-27/drought-parched-mississippi-river-is-halting-barges.html.
- 27.
Adrian Sainz, “Mississippi Flood of 2011 Caused $2.8B of Economic Damage: Army Corps,” Insurance Journal, February 27, 2013, http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2013/02/27/282875.htm.
- 28.
American Rivers, “America Runs on the Mississippi River,” http://www.ameri canrivers.org/rivers/fun/america-runs-on-the-mississippi-river/.
- 29.
Campbell Robertson, “Gulf of Mexico Has Long Been Dumping Site,” The New York Times, July 29, 2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/30/us/30gulf.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0.
- 30.
Darryl Fears, “Drought Threatens to Halt Critical Barge Traffic on Mississippi,” The Washington Post, January 6, 2013, http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/drought-threatens-to-halt-critical-barge-traffic-on-mississippidrought-threatens-to-halt-critical-barge-traffic-on-mississippidrought-threatens-to-halt-critical-barge-traffic-on-mississippi/2013/01/06/92498b88-5694-11e2-bf3e-76c0a789346f_story.html.
- 31.
Craig Cox, Brett Lorenzen, and Soren Rundquist, “Washout: Spring Storms Batter Poorly Protected Soil and Streams,” Environmental Working Group, July 3, 2013, http://www.ewg.org/research/spring-storm-batter-midwest-soil-and-streams.
- 32.
U.S. Department of Agriculture National Resources Conservation Service, “Mississippi River Basin Healthy Watershed Initiative,” http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/detailfull/national/home/?cid = stelprdb1048200.
- 33.
U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Resources and Environmental Indicators, Chapter 6.5, p. 1, http://www.ers.usda.gov/media/873717/wetlands.pdf.
- 34.
Mitsch et al., “Reducing Nitrogen Loading to the Gulf of Mexico from the Mississippi River Basin.”
- 35.
U.S. General Accounting Office, Clean Water Act: Changes Needed if Key EPA Program Is to Help Fulfill the Nation’s Water Quality Goals, December 5, 2013, http://www.gao.gov/products/GAO-14-80.
- 36.
Mississippi River/Gulf of Mexico Watershed Nutrient Task Force, Gulf Hypoxia Action Plan 2008, p. 22, http://water.epa.gov/type/watersheds/named/msbasin/upload/2008_8_28_msbasin_ghap2008_update082608.pdf.
- 37.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Nutrient Pollution: EPA Needs to Work with States to Develop Strategies for Monitoring the Impact of State Activities on the Gulf of Mexico Hypoxic Zone, September 3, 2014, p. 6, http://www.epa.gov/oig/reports/2014/20140902-14-P-0348.pdf.
- 38.
Mississippi River Collaborative, “EPA Lawsuit,” http://www.msrivercollab.org /focus-areas/epa-lawsuit/.
- 39.
Barton and Clarke, Water & Climate Risks Facing U.S. Corn Production, p. 49.
- 40.
Mitsch et al., “Reducing Nitrogen Loading to the Gulf of Mexico from the Mississippi River Basin.”
- 41.
Ibid.
- 42.
Esri, “What Is GIS?” http://www.esri.com/what-is-gis.
- 43.
The Nature Conservancy, “The Flood’s Lingering Effect: New Study Shows Gulf ‘Dead Zone’ One of the Largest on Record,” http://www.nature.org /ourinitiatives/regions/northamerica/areas/gulfofmexico/explore/gulf-of-mexico-dead-zone.xml.
- 44.
Barton and Clarke, Water & Climate Risks Facing U.S. Corn Production, p. 49.
- 45.
Ibid., p. 50.
- 46.
Michelle Perez, Sara Walker, and Cy Jones, Nutrient Trading in the MRB: A Feasibility Study for Using Large-Scale Interstate Nutrient Trading in the Mississippi River Basin to Help Address Hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico, World Resources Institute, http://pdf.wri.org/nutrient_trading_in_mrb_feasibility_study.pdf.
- 47.
Ibid.
- 48.
Evan Branosky, Cy Jones, and Mindy Selman, “Comparison Table of State Nutrient Trading Programs in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed,” World Resources Institute, May 2011, p. 6, http://www.wri.org/sites/default/files/comparison_tables_of_state_chesapeake_bay_nutrient_trading_programs.pdf.
- 49.
Perez et al., Nutrient Trading in the MRB, p. 11.
- 50.
Barton and Clarke, Water & Climate Risks Facing U.S. Corn Production, p. 9.
- 51.
1 Mississippi, “Dead Zone Size of Connecticut Demands Federal Action,” http://1mississippi.org/dead-zone-size-of-connecticut-demands-federal-action/.
- 52.
Mitsch et al., “Reducing Nitrogen Loading to the Gulf of Mexico from the Mississippi River Basin.”
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© 2015 Joe Whitworth
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Whitworth, J. (2015). Getting Clear on the Big Muddy. In: Quantified. Island Press, Washington, DC. https://doi.org/10.5822/978-1-61091-615-8_9
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