Ix. Marine Pollution Monitoring and Assessment

IX.  MARINE POLLUTION MONITORING AND ASSESSMENT

·  The most comprehensive and effective approach for assessing marine pollution involves the integration of chemical, ecological, and toxicity data. Ecological surveys of populations or communities in areas likely to be affected by contaminant inputs mainly yield indirect or circumstantial evidence of contaminant impact.

A.  Bioassay tests

·  Bioassys, using indigenous species (if available) or “standardized” sensitive forms. The toxicity of a chemical contaminant to an organism is a function of its concentration and the duration of exposure.

B.  Ecological surveys

·  The goals of most marine monitoring program are:

(1) To determine that human health is not threatened;

(2)To ensure that waste disposal has not harmed marine

ecosystems or marine resources.

(3)To supply managers with data that enables them to make

Informed decisions regarding continued. It is necessary to monitor marine ecosystems to establish the magnitude, spatial distribution, and temporal distribution of anthropogenic impacts in the receiving environment.

·  More specifically, changes in benthic community structure have been an important element for years in monitoring biological effects of pollutants.

·  Changes in water quality by dredging and dredged-spoil disposal also can adversely affect plankton and nekton by increasing nutrients and turbidity, while decreasing dissolved oxygen levels. Three laboratory procedures used in this regard are:

(1) Elutriate tests;

(2) Bulk or total sediment analysis.

(3) Bioassay tests (liquid-phase, suspended particulate phase, and

solid-phase bioassays).

·  There are some positive effects associated with dredging and dredged-spoil disposal. For example, dredging can improve circulation in estuaries and shallow embayment. By increasing nutrient levels, primary production may increase in the system.

C.  LITTER

·  Litter, or marine debris, is an escalating global problem in the marine environment. Environmentally persistent debris, particularly plastics, has been responsible for devastating impacts on fish, marine birds, sea turtles, cetaceans.

·  Some potentially affected species (e.g., the Hawaiian monk seal, green sea turtle, and British Columbia sea otter) are considered to be endangered, and certain human induced mortalities associated with ghost fishing and ingestion of plastics can further jeopardize them.

·  Enforcement of national environmental regulations and international treaties on pollution should help to mitigate marine litter problems in the sea.

D.  COASTAL DEVELOPMENT IMPACTS

·  The NS&T Program assesses the levels of more than 70 chemical contaminants and certain associated effects in biota and sediments from the sampling sites (Table 4).

A.  Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program

·  EMAP: is a comprehensive environmental network of the U.S. EPA designed to:

(1) Estimate the current status and trends in the condition of the nation’s

ecological resources on a regional basis, with known confidence;

(2) Seek associations between human-induced stress and ecological

Conditions.

(3) Provide periodic statistical summaries and interpretive reports on

ecological status and trends to resource managers and the public.

Several features of EMPA are particularly advantageous:

First, estimates of status and trends can be made with quantifiable

confidence since EMPA is probability based.

Second, monitoring and assessments focus on biological indicators of

response to natural and human-induced stress; indicators of pollutant exposure and habitat condition are sampled simultaneously to provide a context for interpreting biological indicators.

Third, EMAP monitoring is regional and national in scale, rather than

local.

·  Monitoring of benthic in fauna confers several important advantages over the use of laboratory bioassays alone.

First, resident benthic in fauna yield data on impacts to the ecosystem of concern, whereas laboratory bioassays often use species not indigenous to the test site.

Second, in situ benthic in fauna may reflect conditions in the field better than laboratory bioassay species.

Third, benthic species at field sites may be responding to chronic contaminant stresses, but effective long-term chronic bioassay tests in marine monitoring programs are generally lacking, owing in part to their prohibitive costs.

B.  NATIONAL POLLUTANT MONITORING AND ASSESSMENT

PROGRAM

Two major programs are underway to monitor and assess the environmental quality of estuarine and coastal marine waters nationwide. The programs are the NOAA’s National Status and Trends (NS&T) Program and the U.S. EPA Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program (EMP).

1. National Status and Trends Program

NOAA has monitored the concentration of toxic organic compounds and trace metals in bottom-feeding fish, shellfish, and sediments through its NS&T Program:

(1) the National Benthic Surveillance Project, which was initiated in 1984, analyzes contaminants in bottom fish and sediments collected from 149 sampling sites;

(2) The Mussel Watch Project, which commenced in 1986, analyzes contaminants from more than 250 sampling sites (Figure 19).