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Despite decades of regulation and mitigation efforts, harmful pollutants still make their way into water systems, damaging ecosystems, harming drinking water supplies and limiting recreational opportunities.
In a recent FirstPerson article published for The Council of State Governments’ Stateline Midwest, Wisconsin Sen. Robert Cowles outlined some new efforts in his state to combat phosphorus and nitrate runoff into waterways from nonpoint sources such as farms fields, roadways and golf courses.
Sen. Cowles explains in the article that the original Clean Water Act passed by Congress in 1972 mostly ignored referencing nonpoint source dischargers because of the difficulty in determining their environmental impact. Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency notes that while “the effects of nonpoint source pollutants on specific waters vary and may not always be fully assessed ... we know that these pollutants have harmful effects."
Point source dischargers are heavily regulated by the Clean Water Act and, in Wisconsin, are required to meet state standards necessary to receive a Wisconsin Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit. One hurdle for these dischargers: the expensive cost of plant upgrades, which often yield minimal improvements to the health of the state's waterways, Cowles says.
Wisconsin has moved ahead with plans to facilitate "water quality trading," in which a farmer or other nonpoint source polluter voluntary agrees to implement land and water management improvements in exchange for payments from a point source polluter. In turn, the point source polluter is rewarded with credits that can go toward meeting WPDES standards.
Wisconsin Act 151 of 2019 created a third-party clearinghouse to facilitate this kind of water quality trading.
"Our hope is that the clearinghouse will be operating by the start of the 2023 growing season," Cowles writes.
“A point source avoids costly facility upgrades to prevent utility ratepayer bills and consumer product prices from skyrocketing; a nonpoint source has the financial incentive to reduce runoff and reap benefits such as increased yields and decreased fertilization costs; the rest of us enjoy the net improvement to water quality,” Cowles writes.
A study released earlier this year by the Environmental Integrity Project found that many rivers, streams, lakes and other waterbodies are impaired due to too much pollution (see table below).
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