Less Little River Dam
Hurricane Matthew’s impacted many North Carolina communities in 2016. One community, Zebulon, saw a historic dam on the Little River breached by the storm’s abundant rainfall. The breach has forced the town to reflect on the dam, its repair cost, and whether it should…
Florida – The Toxic Algae State
Occasionally we use this blog to look outside our state at activities that may give insight to our State’s water resource management. For this post, I wanted to look at a bad situation occurring in Florida. There, sea birds, mammals, fish, and humans are…
A Green White Lake
In May 2018, water quality conditions at White Lake, located in Southeast NC, had deteriorated to the point where the Town of White Lake felt action was needed. Excessive nitrogen and phosphorus in the lake and warm spring temperatures had resulted in high algae…
A New Flow Regime
The 400+ mile long Roanoke River winds its way through less populous areas of southern Virginia and northern North Carolina. It’s a river, however, with a legendary striped bass fishery, much history, and a watershed area larger than the Cape Fear, the largest basin…
Report It!
One helpful aspect of the tech revolution is the ability to look up and learn a wealth of information on almost any place using web maps. This technology connects people with places, helping to answer the important question of where. NC’s Division of Water…
A Mountain Problem Too
In western North Carolina near the Tennessee border, Fontana Lake is an area not typically associated with algal blooms. Unfortunately, the Lake is experiencing just that. The blooms there were first reported in 2012 in the Tuckaseegee arm feeding the lake and began returning…
P R3
An essential nutrient in the growth of plants, phosphorus (P) when found in excess, can runoff and contribute to algal blooms and fish kills. NC boasts the largest integrated phosphate mine in the US located in Aurora NC. Worldwide, the phosphate mining industry is a $76…
20-Years of Water Quality
A November presentation to the NC Environmental Management Commission gave a snapshot of what’s going on with water quality trends in the State from 1997 to 2016. Statewide, Ambient Monitoring Stations, or sites where NC regularly monitors water quality, were examined to give both…
Neuse Opening
What started back in 1997 has reached Falls Lake. Bruce Babbit, then Secretary of the Department of Interior, came to NC looking for a dam removal opportunity to commence a program that would stretch across the nation. Though only 7 feet tall, Quaker Neck…
The Jordan Game
Not the basketball player whose game was enjoyable to watch but the unnerving game being played with water supply for Triangle communities. This past spring, the NC leg passed Session Law 2017-57, a budget bill funding experimental technologies for reducing harmful effects of nutrient…