Reducing air pollution can lead to improvements in water quality

The move to decrease air pollution throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed throughout the last decade has resulted in an improvement in the area's water quality.

Over the last ten years people and businesses throughout Chesapeake Bay have reduced the amount of nitrogen air pollution being produced; whilst this has improved the area's air pollution levels, it has also led to a marked decrease in water pollution levels.

This unexpected side effect of reducing air pollution has also been recorded in other towns and countries. It has been estimated by the Bay Programme that the levels of nitrogen within Chesapeake Bay have reduced by around ten per cent since 1985. This equates to around 35 million pounds of nitrogen.

Nitrogen can cause a variety of issues when it enters water from the air, including allowing the growth of algae that can be detrimental to other types of wildlife found within local water systems. The introduction of air pollution controls has proved an effective course of control for water pollution, by lowering the biological availability of nitrogen throughout water systems.

The reduction of nitrogen water pollution has been a huge success for the Chesapeake area. Nitrogen air pollution within the Bay area was previously classed as 'uncontrollable', but is now counted on the Bay pollution diet as they are further reduced.

Lewis Linker, modelling coordinator for the Environmental Protection Agency's Bay Programme Office, said:"That's recognition that national laws are driving the air reductions, and those national laws have knock-on benefits, and those benefits are to estuaries everywhere."

Nitrogen is the most common atmospheric gas; however it is not usually available to be used by plant life. Air pollutant forms of nitrogen are able to be used by plants on land and within water, which can ultimately lead to problems with local ecosystems, animal and plant life.