Climate Study Uncovers Bad News for Water Quality

Increased precipitation from a changing climate could pollute U.S. waterways with excess nitrogen, increasing the likelihood of severe water quality impairment from coast to coast, according to a new study by scientists Eva Sinha and Anna Michalak of the Carnegie Institution for Science and Venkatramani Balaji of Princeton University.The results are published in the journal Science.The effects will be especially strong in the Midwest and Northeast, researchers found, as nutrients cause eutrophication, toxin-producing algae blooms and low-oxygen dead zones.Over the past several years, dead zones and algae blooms in coastal regions across the United States — including the Gulf of Mexico,