Iowa Water Quality

As Iowa researchers continue the search for a new funding source for the state’s largest water sensor network — which provides real-time data about nitrate, phosphorus and flow levels in the state’s rivers and streams — the network’s director said Iowa’s nitrate issues are continuing to expand.

Of the 38 agricultural violators identified this year, only one has been fined for its violations, in a “sweetheart deal” according to lawyers involved in a case against the facility.

Despite continued contamination and nitrate spikes in Iowa’s rivers and streams this year, University of Iowa researcher Elliot Anderson insists that the state’s water quality issues can be solved.

In a meeting with Linn County officials Monday, Larry Weber — who oversees a program that deploys dozens of sensors in rivers and streams across Iowa — said the quality of the state’s water is not improving, and that monitoring of the water must continue.

Linn County Sustainability Director Cara Matteson explains the reasoning behind the research.

In an effort to keep an Iowa water quality sensor program afloat past next June, Polk County Supervisors voted this week to invest funds in it, and they invited Linn and Johnson counties to do the same.

Environmental groups penned a letter to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency urging the federal agency to maintain its previously rescinded ruling that seven segments of Iowa rivers were impaired due to nitrate concentrations.

Linn County will partner with University of Iowa researchers to learn more about water quality and pollution sites within the county through three studies that will act as the “backbone” of the county’s comprehensive water quality management and mitigation plan.

The quality of Iowa’s water is a top environmental concern in Iowa, and for many Iowans, there can be a feeling of helplessness. That’s where Heather Wilson comes in. Her work at the Izaak Walton League strives to remove the “barriers of entry” to make water quality testing and advocacy more accessible to the public.

It’s the first of several that the Nishnabotna Water Defenders, a nonprofit advocating for water quality in southwest Iowa, plans to install.

Time has run out on a short-term plan to continue funding a network of sensors that monitors the water quality in Iowa’s rivers and streams. Unless new funding can be secured, dozens of sensors will be taken offline next year, eliminating the ability to measure nitrate and phosphorus to see if conservation practices are working.

The Nature Conservancy has studied this form of virtual fencing with cattle at its preserve in Muscatine County for the past three years.