Ecological Knowledge and Environmental Problem-Solving Concepts and Case Studies (1986) / Chapter Skim
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20. Control of Eutrophication in Lake Washington
20. Control of Eutrophication in Lake Washington
Pages 301-316
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From page 301... ...
The Lake Washington case study is an example of creative interaction between the scientific community and the political arena in the development and execution of a plan that resulted in striking and rapid improvement of the quality of the waters of this lake, which was being increasingly influenced by growth of the metropolitan Seattle area.
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From page 302... ...
Scientific knowledge helped to define possible future conditions of Lake Washington, and voting citizens selected the course. The story of deterioration and recovery of water quality in Lake Washington on the one hand reflects changes in demographics and politics of a city and its suburbs and on the other hand shows a development and application of scientific thought on a problem that required special qualities of scientific leadership and communication for public education.
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From page 303... ...
While these first steps were being discussed in the political arena, scientific investigations of Lake Washington attracted public notice with release of Technical Bulletin 18 of the Washington Pollution Control Commission, An Investigation of Pollution Effects in Lake Washington (1952-1953) (Peterson, 19554.
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From page 304... ...
In December, Edmondson wrote a letter to James Ellis that marked his first involvement in the public action. James Ellis had been appointed chairman of Seattle's newly established Metropolitan Problems Advisory Committee by Mayor Gordon Clinton, and Edmondson wanted to ensure that Ellis and the committee understood that even well-treated sewage contained enough nutrients to stimulate the growth of plants in the lake.
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From page 305... ...
Evans, a first-term representative, former King County engineer, and future governor. The act permitted the formation of a metropolitan government with any or all of six functions: water supply, sewage and garbage disposal, transportation, comprehensive planning, and park administration.
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From page 306... ...
His scientific publications during this period traced the departure of chemical and biological conditions from the historical conditions and attempted to discern the general quantitative relationships between nutrient additions and primary productivity in lakes. Edmondson had been able to predict in his letter to Ellis of February 1957 a serious and rapid decline in water quality.
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From page 307... ...
The rest of the public record is a series of congratulatory editorials and progress reports in city and suburban newspapers. One by one, waste treatment plants around the lake had their effluent diverted.
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From page 308... ...
Wuhrmann doubted that principles governing ion speciation and fluxes inside model tanks could be freely extrapolated to whole lakes. Their friendly wager that summer and Wuhrmann's delivery of one bottle of Scotch during the 1971 congress in Leningrad highlight the intellectual excitement and new understanding that the Lake Washington experiment afforded to professional limnologists.
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From page 309... ...
Selective predation is known to be a major force in determining species composition in zooplankton communities (Hrbacek, 1962; Hrbacek et al., 19611. Neomysis mercedis, which was very abundant during the l950s and early 1960s, suddenly declined in the mid-1960s with the rise of the longfin smelt Spirinchus thaleichthys.
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From page 310... ...
REFERENCES Algae increase noted in Lake Washington. Seattle Times.
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From page 311... ...
1934. Chemische und physikalische Untersuchungen norddeutscher Seen.
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From page 312... ...
. Washington Pollution Control Commission Tech.
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From page 313... ...
Similar reasoning helped to establish the likely causes for species alterations. No amount of descriptive field study alone would establish causality firmly enough to permit quantitative management decisions.
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From page 314... ...
Despite the obvious success in curbing pollution of the lake, the experiment could not by itself prove that phosphorus was the culprit, even though predictions had been based on that assumption. The action of removing waste treatment effluent from a lake lacks the rigor of a conventional laboratory experiment, in that many factors are manipulated simultaneously.
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From page 315... ...
Three-stage waste treatment plants around the lake with chemical precipitation processes for the removal of the phosphate were introduced. The first started operating in 1967; since then, all Zurich treatment plants have had precipitation installations to eliminate phosphate (Dietlicher, 1974~.
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From page 316... ...
1969. Kulturbeeinflusste chemische und biologische Veranderungen des Zurichsees im Verlaufe von 70 Jahren.
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