EPA's BEACH Report:
v, 
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2010 Summary Results
How many notification actions were reported
and how long were they?
Louisiana issues beach advisories when water
quality standards are exceeded. A total of
20 monitored beaches had at least one advisory
issued during the 2010 swimming season. Figure
2 presents a full breakdown of notification action
durations. This figure includes advisories issued
when water quality standards were exceeded. It
does not include closures issued following beach
contamination from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
What percentage of days were beaches under a
notification action?
For Louisiana's 2010 swimming season, actions
due to exceedances of recreational water quality
standards were reported about 55 percent of the
time (Figure 3). This percentage does not include
oil contamination closures associated with the
Deepwater Horizon spill.
How do 2010 results compare to previous years?
Table 2 compares 2010 notification action data
with monitored beach data from previous years.
However, due to annual changes in monitoring
tier assignments, these results cannot be directly
interpreted. A thorough analysis of water quality
trends is presented in Louisiana's annual report.
What pollution sources possibly affect
investigated monitored beaches?
Louisiana has conducted sanitary surveys of all
monitored beaches and continues to investigate
possible sources of contamination at monitored
beaches with high exceedance rates. However, no
possible sources of pollution affecting Louisiana's
monitored beaches were identified in 2010 (Figure 4).
Figure 2: Beach notification actions by duration.
For More Information
For general information about beaches:
www.epa.gov/beaches/
For information about beaches in
Louisiana, including the Program's
annual report, Louisiana BEACH
Grant Report, 2010 Swimming Season:
www.ophbeachmonitoring.com
30 i
25
(/)
¦2 20 -
o
^ 15 i
o
4 10
5 "
2	3-7 8-30
Duration of Actions (Days)
Figure 3:
Beach days with
and without
notification
actions.
Beach days
with no action:
2,209
(44.7%)
Beach days
with an action:
2,732
(55.3%)
Table 2. Beach notification actions, 2008-2010.

2008
2009
2010
Number of monitored
beaches
26
27
27
Number of beaches
affected by notification
actions
26
26
20
Percentage of beaches
affected by notification
actions
100%
96%
74%
Percentage of beach
days affected by
notification actions
66%
53%
55%
Figure 4: Percent of investigated monitored beaches
affected by possible pollution sources (27 beaches).
o
10 20
30
Percent of beaches
40 50 60 70
Investigated I no sources found
Non-storm related runoff
Storm-related runoff
Agricultural runoff
Boat discharge
Cone, animal feeding operation
Combined sewer overflow
Sanitary sewer overflow
Publicly-owned treatment works
Sewer line leak or break
Septic system leakage
Wildlife
Other (identified) source(s)
Unidentified source(s)
80 90 100
—I	1	
¦ 100
Note: A single beach may
have multiple sources.
100
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