USDA Chips In Additional $41 Million To Clean Up Lake Erie
March 29, 2016 A federal program to reduce farm runoff in Ohio, Michigan and Indiana that helps feed harmful algae in Lake Erie will more than double in size, USDA said Monday, reports John Seewer with the Associated Press.
The addition of $41 million will provide an overall total of $77 million toward cutting phosphorus runoff in western Lake Erie over three years.
The USDA will work with farmers by developing plans including planting strips of grass or cover crops that help the soil filter pollutants.
Lake Erie continues to be plagued by algae blooms that produce the kind of toxins that contaminated Toledo’s water supply in 2014. The bloom that spread across the lake last summer was the largest on record, covering an area roughly the size of New York City.
Algae blooms — linked to phosphorus from farm fertilizers, livestock manure and sewage treatment plants — have been blamed for fouling drinking water and contributing to oxygen-deprived dead zones where fish can’t survive.
Read the full story from Seewer over at LancasterOnline.com.
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