Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement

From Great Lakes Wiki

[edit]

Aims of the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement

The Great Lakes Water Quality agreement targeted 14 impairments in the Great Lakes regions, this means there are 14 uses of the Great Lakes that are harmed by environmental degredation.

The impairments fall into one of four categories:

Human use and welfare (example: foul smelling drinking water)
Human health (example: beach closings because of high bacteria counts)
Ecological health and welfare (example: animal deformities due to toxic exposures)
Fish and wildlife habitat (example: loss of bird habitat in wetlands)

[edit]

From Annex 2 of the Great Lakes Water Quality agreement came the development of Remedial Action Plans; made in conjunction with the Environment Canada to clean up the lakes based on the corruption of fourteen beneficial uses.

Snapping turtle on the St. Lawrence by Moondigger

-Restrictions on fish and wildlife consumption.
-Tainting of fish and wildlife flavor.
-Degradation of fish wildlife populations.
-Fish tumors or other deformities.
-Bird or animal deformities or reproduction problems.
-Degradation of benthos.
-Restrictions on dredging activities.
-Eutrophication or undesirable algae.
-Restrictions on drinking water consumption, or taste and odor problems.
-Beach closings.
-Degradation of aesthetics.
-Added costs to agriculture or industry.
-Degradation of phytoplankton and zooplankton populations.
-Loss of fish and wildlife habitat.