Little Pond Returning To Health | The Falmouth Enterprise

Note: Together with undergraduates enrolled in MBL programs, MBL Research Scholar Ken Foremen installed test wells around Little Pond in Falmouth in 2015, coincident with the town’s construction of a sewer system to divert wastewater away from the polluted pond. For several years, Foreman and students sampled regularly from the wells to monitor if and how well the new sewer system was helping to improve pond water quality.

Dr. Kenneth H. Foreman, research scholar of the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) and member of the water quality management committee, said it is important to understand just how poor the health of the Little Pond estuary was before sewering.

The narrow estuary has seen approximately 65% decrease in nitrogen loading in the past nine years since sewer construction and connection began in 2016.

Before the Little Pond sewer project was installed, Little Pond was ranked number five in a 2010 study published in the scientific journal Elsevier of seventy-four of the most nitrogen-impaired estuaries in southern New England.

Since sewers were introduced to the area, 0.97 pounds of nitrogen per acre of estuary area per day has been reduced to 0.34 pounds of nitrogen. The target to reach for, known as the total maximum daily load, is 0.25 pounds per acre per day.

“We’re getting close to the target,” Dr. Foreman said. Read rest of article here. 

Source: Little Pond Returning to Health | The Falmouth Enterprise