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NUTRIENT CRITERIA TECHNICAL GUIDANCE MANUAL - ESTUARINE AND COASTAL MARINE WATERS, OCTOBER 2001
Citation:
Barrera, J., R. Cantilli, I. Davis, E H. Dettmann, J. Fisher, D A. Flemer, T. Gardner, G. Gibson, D. Hart, J S. Latimer, S. Libby, G. Smith, C. Siciliano, AND J. Word. NUTRIENT CRITERIA TECHNICAL GUIDANCE MANUAL - ESTUARINE AND COASTAL MARINE WATERS, OCTOBER 2001. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC, EPA-822-B-01-003, 2002.
Description:
Nutrient overenrichment is a major cause of water pollution in the United States. The purpose of this manual is to provide scientifically defensible technical guidance to assist States, authorized Tribes, and other governmental entities in developing numeric nutrient criteria for estuaries and coastal waters under the authority of the Clean Water Act, Section 304a. Because of differing geographic and climatic conditions among the East, Gulf, and West Coasts, uniform national criteria for estuarine and coastal waters are not appropriate; they should be developed at State, regional, or individual waterbody levels. This manual therefore does not provide guidance on how to set nationwide criteria, but provides State and Tribal water resource quality managers with guidance on how to set nutrient criteria themselves relative to EPA regional criteria. It explores some approaches to classification of estuaries and coastal shelf systems, although classification schemes are still being actively developed and need considerable improvement. The manual describes a minimum set of variables that are recommended for criteria development and describes methods for developing appropriate values for these criteria. It also provides information on sampling, monitoring, data processing, modeling, and approaches to implementation and management responses.