New Interactive Map Shows Ohio’s Vulnerability to Algal Blooms

Today, the National Wildlife Federation launched an interactive story map, Unnatural Disasters: Climate Change and the Mounting Threats to People and Wildlife, which shows where hurricanes, algal outbreaks, wildfires, droughts, and floods have hit in recent years across the United States — and demonstrates their impacts on local economies and wildlife. The map also explains how scientists now have the tools to attribute certain worsening natural disasters to climate change, which is making them more frequent and damaging than ever before.

Here in Ohio, harmful algal blooms have continued to plague the Western Basin of Lake Erie and other bodies of water like Buckeye Lake in Central Ohio. While many factors contribute to harmful algal outbreaks, including the use of fertilizers and farm manure and changes in water flow, climate change and warmer water temperatures are significant factors. More rainfall, brought on by climate change in some regions, is also expected to increase runoff from agriculture fields, flushing pollutants into streams and lakes and contributing to the nitrogen and phosphorus loading that triggers the outbreaks. Runoff is made worse by heavy rains, and the Midwest has seen a 37 percent increase in heavy rainfall events the past 40 years. Other studies have found that higher temperatures will lead to longer outbreak seasons and higher potential algal growth rates.

In March of 2018, the Kasich Administration declared the Western Basin of Lake Erie impaired after years of delay. Recent scientific studies have shown that the lake had met the criteria to be declared impaired back in 2010. In August 2014, a toxic algal bloom left Toledo residents without drinkable water for nearly three days.

“Ohioans are already seeing the disastrous impacts of climate change in our lakes and waterways,” said Frank Szollosi, Manager of Regional Outreach Campaigns at NWF in Ohio. “The state shouldered an estimated cost burden of $65 million as a result of the 2014 toxic algal bloom in Lake Erie. In addition, we must not lose sight of the fact that the eight Ohio counties bordering the lake generate $14.1 billion in revenue for local businesses and account for one in every 11 jobs in that region. There is not time to play politics with our health, our economy, or Ohio’s natural treasures.”

Clean up of Lake Erie has hit another snag, as the Ohio Soil and Water Conservation Commission objects to the Kasich administration’s plan to designate eight watersheds in the Maumee River basin with high levels of phosphorus as distressed. The phosphorus in these waterways feeds the formation of toxic algal blooms and threatens public health. Symptoms of algal poisoning include nausea, vomiting, and stomach cramping.

The U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change issued a new report this month warning of cataclysmic levels of global warming unless policymakers begin "rapid and far-reaching" transitions in land management, energy, industry, building efficiency, transportation, and smart growth.

In 2017 alone, disasters like Hurricanes Harvey and Maria and wildfires in the West led to more than 3,000 fatalities and caused $306 billion in cumulative costs — a new record.

“The threat of climate change-fueled natural disasters cannot be contained to any one region or state — and it’s a problem we all need to urgently address together,” said Shannon Heyck-Williams, senior manager for climate and energy at the National Wildlife Federation. “We need lawmakers and other leaders in the public and private sectors to invest in serious climate mitigation and resilience strategies and to ramp up investments in renewable energy and transportation. The latest science is shouting a warning to all of us: we may only have a decade to prevent irreversible damage to the global climate and the people and wildlife living on Earth. There’s no better time to roll up our sleeves and get to work.”

View the interactive disaster map at NWF.org/UnnaturalDisasters.

Read the National Wildlife Federation’s climate change policy recommendations for adaptation and mitigation HERE.