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North Carolina is being slammed by a succession of disasters triggered by Hurricane Florence. The latest scare is from coal plants, where pools of ash are at risk of spilling into already toxic waters. 
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Thirty years and $2 billion later, Lake Okeechobee pollution remains three to four times higher than target limits set in 2000 while the state focused clean-up efforts to the south, where a federal lawsuit set strict limits on pollution.
PIRatE Lab's insight:
The answers here should have been straightforward. But the reality was that they were politically difficult, requiring actual leadership and the expenditure of funds to reign in selfish, short-term benefits to few at the expense of everything else.
Florida is (unfortunately) a basket case when it comes to water quality and serious efforts to bolster sustainable systems.
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A study of grasslands on six continents suggests a way to counteract the human-made overdose of fertilizer that threatens the biodiversity of the world's prairies. The solution originates in nature: let grazing animals crop fast growing grasses, which have a competitive advantage in an over-fertilized world. The grasses block sunlight from ground level, but herbivores make light available to other plants.
PIRatE Lab's insight:
Awesome study. The patterns we have seen in coastal California grasslands are also going on across the globe.
If you are new to our California grasslands, check out our heroes of native grass (or at least the natives that have survived this past century of fertilization, etc.): http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2014-03/ajob-ses031014.php
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Excess phosphorus can run off into streams and lakes and become an ecological disaster.
PIRatE Lab's insight:
A great discussion of one of the many "hidden" downsides of the Green Revolution. Nitrogen is the classic "limiting nutrient" (side note: I hate the whole "limiting" element line of argument/thought...although that is a story for another day) for terrestrial ecosystems (particularly agricultural systems). Phosphorus is the classic "limiting nutrient" for aquatic systems.
Those of us working on coastal estuaries and water bodies are the "bottom of the drain" if you will and so have taken the heaviest hit in terms of the dark side of our new normal of meat production post-WWII.
Anyone interested can check out our first attempt to inventory 30 coastal estuaries in the Mediterranean climate region of the Southern California Bight (here and here).
There really is not that much we can do to mitigate this pollutant once it gets into the waterbody itself. Hence the focus on reducing inputs and (among other things) modifying how we produce meat.
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Scientists have found a polluted ‘dead zone’ of ocean that is larger than Wales and the biggest ever recorded in the Gulf of Mexico. Via ThePlanetaryArchives/BlackHorseMedia - San Francisco
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The guacamole-thick algae that fouled both coasts earlier in July will likely be a regular occurrence for the Sunshine State. Here’s why.
PIRatE Lab's insight:
Man, I think we need to add a algal bloom score to our beach assessments!
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More than half the fine will be spent on the capital costs of a midtown environmental project.
PIRatE Lab's insight:
Nitrogen inputs to the Santa Clara River estuary.
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