vxEPA
United States
Environmental Protection
Agency
New Index of
Environmental Condition
for Coastal Watersheds in
the Great Lakes Basin
U.S. Great Lakes Basin
environmental condition by watershed
INTRODUCTION
The Great Lakes is the largest system of surface freshwater on
the earth. It contains about 20% of the earth's fresh water
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and about 90% of the freshwater in the United States.
The wealth of natural resources has made this area a
center of economic activity for the United States. From
mining, forestry, and agriculture to recreation and shipping,
human activities have taken a toll on the natural environment.
In response to the continued degradation of the Great Lakes, the
United States and Canada signed the Great Lakes Water Quality
Agreement in 1972. The goal of this agreement was "restoring the
chemical, physical and biological integrity of the waters of the Great
Lakes Basin ecosystem" to achieve healthy populations of plants, fish, and
wildlife and to protect human health. To monitor progress towards this goal,
measurements of human-caused stress must be made over a period of time to
evaluate changes in environmental condition.
Ecological Indicator: Scientists with the Great Lakes Environmental Indicator (GLEI) Project
(http://glei.nrri.umn.edu) have developed a Condition Index that indicates the region's environmental
condition by watershed. The index is based on 207 individual stressors* that fall into five dominant
human-derived stresses to ecological condition: 1) type of land use, 2) amount of agricultural activity,
3) point sources of pollution, 4) atmospheric deposition, and 5) human population density. The
stresses in each watershed were summarized and the resulting scores were distributed over a gradient
from worst (red) to best (green) indicating the Environmental Condition of each coastal watershed,
as depicted on the map (right) of the U.S. Great Lakes basin. Using updated versions of appropriate
databases and GIS techniques, managers can produce similar Condition Indexes for their area.
Best
I
* The use of all 207 stressors allowed a more complete synthesis of
human impacts; however, something analogous could be done using
only land-use classifications.
HUMAN STRESS GRADIENT OF COASTAL ZONES
GLEI researchers have developed a unique way to divide
the coastal regions of the Great Lakes in the U.S. into 762
watersheds that encompassed the larger tributary streams and
adjacent shoreline. For each of these watersheds a Condition
Index was calculated, as described above, that reflects the
amount and type of human stress within the watershed.
To link the land-based Condition Index to the health of Great
Lakes coastal aquatic ecosystems (e.g., wetlands, beaches
and bays), GLEI researchers sampled communities of birds,
amphibians, diatoms, fish, macroinvertebrates, and wetland
vegetation at sites across the range of the Condition Index.
Water quality and contaminant levels were also sampled at
many of the sites. Indicators of biological condition based
on these samples were found to be correlated with the
Condition Index. Researchers have also identified linkages
between the particular types of stressors (such as certain
types of non-point source pollution) and the biological
communities of the streams and shorelines. Based on these
relationships, diagnostic indices of ecological condition
have been developed. Diagnostic indices can be used to
guide management toward targeting specific stressors for
restoration or remediation goals. Several examples are
available (although not yet published) from the researchers
listed below.
Danz, N.P., R.R. Regal, G.J. Niemi, V. Brady, T. Hollenhorst, L.B. Johnson, G.E. Host, J.M.
Hanowski, C.A. Johnston, T. Brown, J. Kingston, and J.R. Kelly. 2005. Environmentally
Stratified Sampling Design for the Development of Great Lakes Environmental Indicators.
Enviror nent 102:41-65. (http://glei.nrri.umn.edu)
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vvEPA
United States
Environmental Protection
Agency
Office of Research and Development
Washington DC
EPA/600/S-05/005
August 2005
This research is funded by
•U.S. EPA-Science To Achieve
Results (STAR) Program
Grant #EE25=1
Environmental Application: The
Condition Index is a tool useful to
environmental managers for prioritizing
problems (e.g., loss of wetlands) across
the Great Lakes region and placing
these areas into a larger regional or
national context. Generally, areas in the
southern and eastern Great Lakes have
much higher levels of human-induced
stresses than do areas in the northern
Great Lakes. This information can be
used to identify areas that should be
protected, and to prioritize areas in
need of restoration. Although all of the
datasets that make up the Condition
Index are publicly available, no one has
previously put them together to give an
overall picture of the human pressures in
this region.
The analyses also hold promise for EPA's
Region V, the Great Lakes National
Program Office, and other regional
water programs in establishing a design
framework for monitoring biological
resources and diagnosing causes of
human impairment across the Great
Lakes coastal zone.
The Index of Environmental Condition
map provides a tool for resource
managers to identify areas vulnerable
to loss of wetlands, coastal areas in
need of protection or restoration, and
a mechanism to monitor change over
time in human use and its impact on
watersheds.
EPA's Science to Achieve Results (STAR)
Estuarine and Great Lakes (EaGLe) Program
GLEI
Great Lakes Environmental Indicators Project
- University of Minnesota - University of Wisconsin
- University of Michigan flk - John Carroll University
,- Cornell University JRr ~ University of Windsor, Ontario
- South Dakota State University
ASC
Atlantic Slope Consortium
Pennsylvania State University
o—
^-^ !
PEEIR
Pacific Estuarine
Ecosystem Indicator
Research Consortium
University of California-Davis
O
EaGLe Program HQ
Washington DC
0
CEER GOM
Consortium for Estuarine Ecoindicator
Research for the Gulf of Mexico
University of Southern Mississippi
ACE INC
Atlantic Coast Environmental
Indicators Consortium
University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill
U.S. EPA ORD
National Center for Environmental Research
Barbara Levinson
202-343-9720
Levinson.Barbara@epa.gov
http://es.epa.gov/ncer/centers/eagles
Printed on chlorine free 100% recycled paper with
100% post-consumer fiber using vegetable-based ink.
Direct and indirect effects of human activities
have taken a toll on the nation's estuaries,
yet few direct linkages have been identified
between human activities on land and responses
in estuarine ecosystems. The Great Lakes
Environmental Indicators (GLEI) project is one of five
national projects funded by EPA's EaGLe program.
The goal of the EaGLe program is to develop the next
generation of ecological indicators that can be used in
a comprehensive coastal monitoring program.
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