United States
                    Environmental Protection
                   Agency
                                              Office of Research and
                                             Development
                                             Washington, DC 20460
EPA/620/R-01/001C
       July, 2001
                     Coastal   Communications
   CM*
                       NATIONAL COASTAL ASSESSMENT:
                                    RHODE  ISLAND
                            ORD/RE6ION  1/OW/RI DEM
                                                    Rhode Island
                                                    Coastal 2000 Design
                                                   Sampling
                                                   Sites
Background
The U.S. EPA's National Coastal Assessment (NCA),
referred to as Coastal 2000 during the first year of
this program, is a multi-year partnership among EPA's
Office of Research and Development (ORD), EPA's
Office of Water (OW), EPA's Regional Offices, all
coastal states, and selected territories. As part of
this effort, ORD has developed a coastal monitoring
program with EPA Region 1 and the Rhode Island
Department of Environmental Management (RI DEM).
This joint effort will determine the condition of
estuarine waters in Rhode Island (RI), and permit
comparison to other U.S. coastal areas. This effort is
being coordinated by the National Health and
Environmental Effects Research Laboratory's Atlantic
Ecology Division in Narragansett, Rhode Island.
National Coastal Assessment Strategy
The National  Coastal Assessment is a strategic
partnership between EPA and the coastal states
and other federal agencies. Each state uses a
compatible probabilistic design and a common set
of environmental indicators (see Table below) to
independently survey its coastal resources and assess
their condition. These estimates can then be
aggregated to assess conditions at the EPA Regional,
biogeographical, and national levels. All data will be made available for public access on the Internet.
The map shows the coastal areas included in the survey and the number of sampling sites intended for
estuarine waters of Rhode Island. The existing trawl surveys conducted by the RI DEM's Division of
Fish and Wildlife have been integrated with the NCA activities.  Roger Williams University is
conducting this effort for the RI DEM.
                                                                          Map Location
                                                    •
                                                                               ME
                                                               5  10
                                                               ^^^^^^^^B
                                                                Miles
                                                                     15
Water Quality
dissolved oxygen
Salinity, •temperature, depth
PH
Nutrients
Chlorophyll
Sediment Quality
Grain size
Total organic carbon
Sediment chemistry
Benthic community structure
Sediment toxicity
Biota
Benthic community structure
Fish community structure
Fish external pathology
Fish tissue chemical analyses

Further Information
For further information, please contact Chris Deacutis at the Rhode Island Department of
Environmental Management at (401) 222-3961 x7270 or deacutis@etal.uri.edu: or Hilary Snook
at the EPA New England Regional Laboratory in Region 1 at (617) 918-8670 or snook.hilary@epa.gov:
or Tim Scott at Roger Williams University at (401) 254-3563 or tscott@rwu.edu: or John Paul at the
National Health and Environmental Effects Laboratory's Atlantic Ecology Division at (401) 782-3037 or
paul.iohn@epa.gov. Visit the coastal communications web site at http://www.epa.gov/qed/crc.htm.

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