RMP News Volume 4 Issue 1

Contents

Air Deposition

Organophosphate Insecticide
Use

Annual Meeting Summary

RMP Fish
Contamination Pilot Study

1996 RMP Annual Report Highlights

Integrated Environmental Monitoring
and Research Program

Fish Contamination Monitoring in the
Sacramento River Watershed

Monthly Water Quality Monitoring in the
Bay

Around Town

Coastal Water Quality Monitoring Inventory
Plan

Staff Profile: Samir Arora

Calendar

Announcements

By Eric Hansen, City of San Jose

Water quality experts know that pollutants affecting water quality in the
Bay have many sources, one of which is air deposition. Particles or gases
are released into the atmosphere by either natural or anthropogenic sources
and may be transported great distances before being deposited. Deposition
mechanisms include precipitation, dry deposition of vapors and particles,
and cloud and fogwater deposition. These pollutants then find their way
into larger water bodies. While the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality
Control Board (Regional Board) regulates both point and nonpoint sources
of pollution, air as a pollutant transport vehicle has not received much
attention. This is primarily because measuring air deposition is difficult,
and the uncertainties as to what magnitude of pollutant loading is due
to air deposition are large. Despite these uncertainties, an agreement
was drafted in 1987 in the Great Lakes region called the Great Lakes Water
Quality Agreement that added the monitoring of airborne toxics. As a result,
the Great Lakes region has now developed a more complete mass balance concept
that includes several different nonpoint sources in addition to airborne
toxic substances, and the Great Lakes Integrated Atmospheric Deposition
Network has been monitoring pollutant loading from air deposition since
1990. Lessons learned in the Great...