Gulf of Mexico Hypoxia Task Force

Agenda Item 13a

Ohio River Sub Basin Steering Committee

• Sub Basin Team formed in 2003 to represent the interests of the States in the ORB – Originally Illinois was only ORSANCO member

state represented on the Task Force

• John Kessler, ODNR – Chairman 2004-Present

• Looking for new Chairperson

Meeting of the Task Force

• Des Moines, Iowa September 11-13• Combined meeting with National Association

of State Departments of Agriculture.

Meeting Highlights

Size of Hypoxic Zone 2012

Federal Nutrient Reduction Strategy

• Cooperative efforts to assist the states in protecting in-state water quality to also reduce nutrient loadings to the Gulf

• Aligning existing federal programs with hypoxia efforts

– Approach for implementation of nutrient strategies– Financial Assistance– Monitoring and Modeling – Technical Assistance– Communication and Coordination

Monitoring Collaboration

• Establish an integrated long-term, multi-scale MARB water-quality monitoring collaborative based on existing sites and resources and identify monitoring needs/priorities and funding needed to develop a comprehensive MARB-WQMC.

WATERQUALITYDATA.US

NPDATA

SPARROW Decision Support System

Iowa Nutrient Reduction Science Assessment

• Partnership of Iowa State Univ., Iowa Dept of Ag, IDNR , USDA, NRCS, Univ. of Illinois, Univ., of MN

• Performance of Ag BMPs evaluated• Level of implementation and costs evaluated• Workshop November 13-15 in Davenport Iowa

– Hear how Iowa created their state science assessment and generated results. The focus of the workshop is to examine the process and lessons learned, consider the extent to which this can be used by other states, and provide an opportunity to develop state or regional partnerships and next steps.

Pending Litigation• Petition seeking EPA action to require all states to develop

numeric criteria for nutrient pollution or EPA promulgation of federal criteria and TMDLs for nutrient pollution in the MARB– July 2011 EPA denied petition– March 2012 plaintiffs filed lawsuit contesting denial– More than 30 parties have been granted intervenor status– Parties are now negotiating a briefing schedule

• Petition seeking EPA revision of "secondary" treatment standards to include nutrient controls at municipal sewage treatment plants– March 2012 lawsuit over EPA delay in response– August 2012 EPA told the court it would respond by end of year

Next Task Force Meeting

• Spring 2013• Location TBD – Some interest in having it in conjunction with an

ORSANCO Commission Meeting