NJ DEP to Work With Area Institutions in Studying Barnegat Bay

The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) is teaming up with several of the region’s research institutions to perform scientific studies that will help the department make critical decisions on how to restore and enhance the ecologically stressed Barnegat Bay, announced DEP commissioner Bob Martin. The series of ten studies, along with DEP’s other work, will result in the most comprehensive scientific analysis ever for the bay.

Institutions in cooperation with DEP include the Rutgers University Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences, the New Jersey Sea Grant Consortium, Montclair State University, Rider University, Monmouth University and the Academy of Natural Sciences in Philadelphia.

“Governor [Chris] Christie is committed to restoring Barnegat Bay, an ecological treasure and tourism asset that is important to all of New Jersey” said Martin. “The results of these studies will fill in data gaps and arm us with critical information that will help define future actions we must take to restore the bay and bring it back from many decades of decline.”

The governor’s 10-point comprehensive Barnegat Bay Restoration Plan calls for a variety of strategies to reduce nutrient pollution to the bay, including the nation’s toughest statewide fertilizer law, low-cost funding for local governments to improve storm water control projects, acquisition and protection of land in the watershed to filter pollutants and provide buffers, and development of a Special Area Management Plan to improve coordination among planning jurisdictions.

Long and very shallow, Barnegat Bay has limited inlets to allow flushing of degraded water to the ocean. The bay is becoming eutrophic, meaning that nutrients are causing frequent algae blooms that can cause low dissolved oxygen conditions and block sunlight, affecting the estuary’s overall ecological balance.

The DEP’s Division of Water Quality Monitoring and Standards over the summer launched a bay-wide water quality monitoring network to gather data from both the bay and its tributaries on pollutants, sources of those pollutants, and how water flow affects the health of the bay.

The DEP Office of Science also has been working with the state’s Science Advisory Board, state universities, the U.S. Geological Survey, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Barnegat Bay Partnership to develop and fund additional research projects that will fill in the gaps and establish baseline ecological conditions for the bay for comparison over time.

Source: New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection