Publication Name

Chemical & Engineering News

Author(s)

Britt E. Erickson

The Chesapeake Bay is the largest estuary in the U.S. and home to an estimated 3,600 plant and animal species, including more than 300 types of fish. The 64,000-sq-mile bay watershed is also home to about 17 million people and worth an estimated $1 trillion in terms of fishing, tourism, shipping, and property values.

After more than 25 years of federal, state, and local efforts to improve water quality in the Chesapeake Bay, most of the Bay and its tributaries remain impaired. Excessive amounts of nutrients—nitrogen and phosphorus—continue to enter the Bay each year, leading to algal blooms and oxygen-depleted waters, or “dead zones,” that are uninhabitable for most species.

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Read the full article, Cleaning the Chesapeake, on the Chemical & Engineering News website (subscription required).