Progress Toward Restoring the Everglades The Ninth Biennial Review - 2022 (2023) / Chapter Skim
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Summary
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, a joint effort launched by the state and federal governments in 2000, seeks to reverse the decline of the ecosystem. This multibillion-dollar plan was originally envisioned as a 30- to 40-year effort with 68 individual project components including water storage reservoirs, water quality treatment using constructed wetlands, seepage management, and removal of barriers to sheet flow (e.g., canals, levees)
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, thanks to record funding levels. Large-scale restoration of the natural system is now under way, with the Combined Operational Plan increasing flows to the central Everglades through a suite of recently completed CERP and non-CERP projects and through ongoing restoration in Picayune Strand.
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Summary 3 FIGURE S-1 Locations and status of CERP projects. NOTES: EAA = Everglades Agricultural Area, IRL = Indian River Lagoon.
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The rehydration of Northeast Shark River Slough in Everglades National Park represents the largest step yet toward restoring the hydrology and ecology of the central Everglades. Shifts in vegetation in marl prairies are an early indicator that the predicted restoration benefits of the Combined Operational Plan may be real ized.
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, a mid-course assessment of expected CERP outcomes that accounts for newly identified constraints in storage and incorporates the latest climate change science would inform future management decisions regarding restoration planning, funding, sequencing, and adaptive management. The SFWMD has implemented a rigorous approach to address uncertainties associated with ASR in the Lake Okeechobee Watershed Restoration Plan.
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STA WATER QUALITY AND CERP PROGRESS Implementation and refinement of STAs over the past nearly three decades has resulted in marked reductions in phosphorus concentrations in outflow waters, particularly in STA-3/4, which currently meets the requirements codi fied in the water quality−based effluent limit (WQBEL) .1 A considerable volume of rigorous, peer-reviewed, and applicable science has been generated by the SFWMD, as well as its academic and consulting partners, that has helped inform the design and performance of STAs.
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A rigorous adaptive management program should include development of near-term milestones for each STA flow-way. The WQBEL sets clear quantitative targets to assess STA performance starting in WY 2027, but quantitative interim milestones over the next few years should also be developed based on the activities associated with Restoration Strategies and other STA remediation actions.
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With a mix of specialists, including in biogeochemistry, regional water operations, and agricultural source control mea sures, this group could also advise on data collection, data analysis, research, modeling, and synthesis efforts that inform actionable management activities. Although a variety of factors affect outflow phosphorus concentrations, phosphorus inflow concentrations and loading rates are key drivers affecting WQBEL attainment.
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The USACE and the SFWMD should proactively develop scenarios of future precipitation and temperature change, including changes in variability, and a strategy to use them to inform future project planning decisions and ensure more reliable project performance. USACE project planning efforts seek to identify justifiable solutions to current problems that will ensure performance for the next 50 years at minimum, and USACE policy requires that restoration planning must meaningfully consider climate change trends and potentially increasing climate variability.
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BBSEER provides lessons to inform future CERP planning efforts. Planning should consider the effects of a range of plausible future conditions (precipitation and
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Regular revisions to the System Operating Manual and other major operational plans, such as LOSOM or the Combined Operational Plan, provide an opportunity to incorporate evolving understanding of climate variability and change into Everglades restoration. Several recent major operational planning efforts, such as LOSOM, have proceeded based on analysis of a prior 52-year climate record, with limited assessment of potential changes in future air temperature or precipitation, providing an incomplete view of their performance under potential future conditions.
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The Everglades science enterprise should develop a science plan to advance and implement essential science actions that directly support restoration deci sion making. This effort will require extensive multiagency and stakeholder coordination.
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The plan should be updated every 5 years and with the engagement of a diverse range of stakeholders to respond to changing needs, with annual implementation plans and progress reports to facilitate coordination and communication of progress toward addressing the science needs. The Science Coordination Group is best positioned to lead an updated multiagency assessment of priority science needs and gaps at a programmatic level and to develop an Everglades Restoration Science Plan.
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