Elements of South Florida’s Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan

WILLIAM PERRYEverglades National Park, 40001 State Road 9339, Homestead, Fl 33034, USA (William_b_perry@nps.gov)

Accepted 15 April 2003

Abstract. Approximately 70% less water flows through the Everglades ecosystem today compared with thehistoric Everglades, and the quality of the remaining water is often degraded. The regionally managedhydropattern does not follow the pre-drainage distribution, timing, and duration of the natural Everglades,nor can water move freely though the remaining Everglades. As a result, there have been significantreductions in wildlife and fish populations, their habitat, and the environmental services wetlands providesociety. Both the problems of declining ecosystem health and the solutions to Everglades restoration centeron restoring the quantity, quality, timing, and distribution of water. The Comprehensive EvergladesRestoration Plan consists of over 60 civil works projects that will be designed and implemented over a30 year period. At an estimated cost of $7.8 billion, it seeks to correct an earlier attempt at water man-agement in South Florida and improve water availability during the dry season and reduce flooding ofurban and agricultural areas during the wet season. The plan calls for storage and controlled release frommore than 217,000 acres of new reservoirs and wetland-based treatment areas and from over 300 under-ground aquifer storage and recovery wells. The plans assumes that during retention in stormwater treat-ment areas, the excess phosphorus, nitrogen, agrichemicals such as atrazine, diazinon, endosulfan, andother contaminants will be reduced before release into the natural areas. It also assumes that little or nochange in water quality will occur during underground storage. To improve the hydraulic connectivity ofnatural areas, some of the extensive system of levees and canals within the Everglades will be removed in aneffort to improve overland water flow. Most of the current planning has focused on water storage andrestoring basic hydrology in the remnant natural areas and on phosphorus removal as a benchmark ofwater quality. The restoration plan, as approved by Congress, is conceptual and most of the details,including potential impacts of the plan on the natural system and the role of contaminants remain to beevaluated.

Keywords: Everglades; ecosystem; restoration contaminants

Introduction

The historic Everglades of south Florida encom-passed about 11,000 mi2, over which water onceflowed freely from the Kissimmee River throughLake Okeechobee and southward over a low gra-dient landscape. The destination was the estuariesof Biscayne Bay, the Ten Thousand Islands, andFlorida Bay (Fig. 1). This shallow, slow-moving

sheet of water created a mosaic of ponds, sloughs,sawgrass marshes, hardwood hammocks, and for-ested uplands. Fed by an average rainfall of 62 in.per year in a wet/dry season cycle that is punctu-ated by wet-season hurricanes and dry-season fires,the Everglades evolved into a complex ecosystemthat formed the biological infrastructure forthe southern half of Florida. Because of the de-mands of water management, land use, and urban

Ecotoxicology, 13, 185–193, 2004

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development, the historic Everglades is now only aremnant. The following is a brief overview of theissues and activities that have been undertaken andproposed in an effort to restore, to the extent fea-sible, the remaining Everglades ecosystem.

To the settlers and land developers of the 1800sand 1900s, the wetlands of southern Florida wereconsidered a liability and in need of ‘‘reclama-

tion’’. Large scale dredging efforts between 1905and 1910 opened up large tracts to agriculture anddevelopment, but funding was not available untilthe 1940s for a regional effort. After two disas-terous floods, the US Army Corps of Engineerswas authorized in 1948 by Congress to provideflood control for the region in the Central andSouth Florida Project (C&SF), initiated in 1950.The primary goal was to remove water from theregional landscape, conveying the majority of an-nual rainfall runoff to either the east or west coastof Florida. To accomplish this goal, a system thatincludes over 1000 miles of canals, 720 mile of le-vees, 16 pumping stations, and about 200 controlstructures was built to compartmentalize theEverglades and permit regulation of water levelsamong compartments, including Lake Okeecho-bee. With flood control came the loss of over 70%of the original annual water budget from theEverglades, conveyed to estuaries without passingover the landscape. In addition, the remainingEverglades landscape was divided into hydrologi-cally isolated components. With the availability ofdrained land, agriculture and urban developmenthave reduced the original size of the Everglades by50%. A rapidly expanding urban population hascontinued to affect the remaining natural systemwith increasing water storage demands and floodcontrol in the space-limited geography of SouthFlorida.

The remaining Everglades ecosystem is in acontinuing state of decline, largely as a result ofthe altered regional water regime and degradedwater quality, as evidenced by vegetation change,declining wildlife populations and organic soilloss. At the downstream end of the system, FloridaBay, the Gulf of Mexico, and Biscayne Bay estu-arine ecosystems experience altered salinity re-gimes due to decreased freshwater heads andinflows from the Everglades, with damaging effectson habitats, nursery grounds, and estuarine fauna(USACE, 1999). The effects of drainage and watermanagement in south Florida have resulted insignificant losses of Everglades habitats and de-clines in wildlife populations. Among impactsnoted by the US Army Corps (USACE, 1999):

• 90–95% loss of wading birds.• Threatened loss of species; 68 federally listedspecies.

Figure 1. Pre-drainage Everglades watershed: flow path in the

Everglades before the Central and South Florida Flood Control

Project.

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• Deteriorated water quality (eutrophication andcontaminants).

• Habitat losses or damages.• Declining fishery resources in estuaries andbays.

Everglades restoration goals

Long before it was popular, a number ofthoughtful people in the region pointed out earlyin the 1900s that losses were occurring as thou-sands of square miles of wetlands were drained. In1928, landscape architect Ernest Coe began aconcentrated effort with others to designate landsprotected from drainage and development. Whilehe and his contemporaries were successful inconvincing Congress and the state of Florida to setsignificant amounts of land aside as EvergladesNational Park (ENP) in 1947 and Big CypressNational Preserve in 1974, key issues such as theimpacts of water management to these lands andtheir wildlife resources were not addressed untildecades later. Even while energetic defenders ofthe Everglades, such as Marjorie StonemanDouglas, raised public awareness, the C&SF Pro-ject was profoundly altering the quantity, quality,and timing of water availability to the remainingEverglades ecosystem.

Before the C&SF Project was completed, anumber of corrective projects were initiated toaddress the unintended consequences of the floodcontrol system and changes in water quality, whichare described in the following paragraphs. How-ever, most were only partly remedial and did notaddress repair of the Everglades as a whole. A re-examination of the C&SF Project was initiated in1993 (known as the Restudy), culminating in 1999with the Comprehensive Everglades RestorationPlan (CERP), which was authorized as part of theFederal Water Resources Development Act of2000. For the purposes of this paper, it will beconvenient to refer to restoration projects as pre-CERP and CERP. Restoration projects prior toCERP primarily addressed water quality concernsfrom agricultural use of drained Everglades landsand the delivery of seasonal of flows to ENP.While CERP also attempts to improve thesefunctions, particularly the timing of water regula-tion in the undeveloped Everglades, it also ad-

dresses the need for storage of water that theCS&F Project now discharges to sea. It should benoted that pre-CERP projects, as a whole, will costabout $7.8 billion and CERP is estimated to costabout $8 billion over a 40-year period. Further-more, the success of CERP will depend on thesuccessful completion of pre-CERP projects.

Pre-CERP restoration projects

C&SF Project Modifications

A part of the C&SF Project in southern DadeCounty, Canal C-111 was authorized in 1962 toprovide flood control to agricultural lands to theeast of ENP (Taylor Slough) and to dischargeflood waters to Taylor Slough and bays on thelower east coast. In doing so, marine and estuarinehabitats have been damaged from hypersalinity,and reduced annual inflows to coastal wetlands innortheast Florida Bay, which is part of ENP.During periods when inland flood control is nee-ded, excess water from urban and agriculturallands are discharged into coastal wetlands, inter-rupting the natural annual hydropattern uponwhich wildlife and fish populations depend. Asenvironmental concerns began to influence theengineering and water management process,modifications to the C-111 system were authorizedin 1994. The goals of the modifications are tomodify the existing operation to more resemblehistoric hydropatterns in Taylor Slough and the C-111 basins, eliminate damaging discharges of floodwaters to Manatee Bay and Barnes Sound, and tomaintain the level of flood protection authorizedby the original project. These goals are expected tobe met with the addition of pumping stations topump back groundwater seepage flows, additionof impoundments to control seepage from theEverglades, and restoration of sheetflow from C-111 to Florida Bay. For details see: http://www.saj.usace.army.mil/projects/index.html.

Kissimmee River Restoration Project

In the 1960s, the upper Everglades watershed, theKissimmee River, was channelized and regulatedwith control structures and canals as part of theC&SF Project. Losses included some 20,000 acres

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of wetlands within the river floodplain along withits fishery and wildlife resources. Authorized in1986, the goal of this project is to disassemblemuch of the original project and repair the damageby restoration of the historic floodplain. It willconsist of backfilling channels, removal of somecontrol structures, and land acquisition. For de-tails see: http://www.saj.usace.army.mil/dp/Kis-simmee.html.

Everglades Construction Project

In 1988, the federal government filed a lawsuitagainst the South Florida Water ManagementDistrict (SFWMD) and the Florida Department ofEnvironmental Protection, alleging that water dis-charged into ENP and the Loxahatchee NationalWildlifeRefuge (Fig. 2) violated State water qualitystandards. In particular, the lawsuit alleged that thefarm runoff from the Everglades Agricultural Area(EAA; Fig. 2) contained excessive levels of nutri-ents such as phosphorus that were causing imbal-ances in natural populations of flora or fauna, aviolation of State Class III water quality standards(United States versus SFWMD and FloridaDepartment of Environmental Regulation, Caseno. 88-1886-CIV-HOEVELER). The lawsuit wassettled in 1991, with the parties agreeing that theecological integrity, and ultimately the survival, ofENP and the wildlife refuge are threatened by in-flows of water containing excess nutrients. Thesettlement agreement, which the federal court en-tered as a Consent Decree in 1992, requires severalaffirmative steps to remedy these problems, and thestate of Florida passed the Everglades Forever Actin 1994. The Everglades Construction Project, cre-ated by this legislation, formed the foundation forthe current effort to reduce the nutrient loads thatwould prevent Everglades restoration. This projectis composed of 12 inter-related construction pro-jects located between Lake Okeechobee and theEverglades. The cornerstone of the project is sixlarge constructed wetlands totaling over47,000 acres. These stormwater treatment areas(STAs), will use naturally occurring biologicalprocesses to reduce the levels of phosphorus thatenter the Everglades to an interim goal of 50 partsper billion (ppb). Research currently under way isfocusing on establishing the long-term phosphoruslevels that will prevent adverse impacts to the

Everglades ecosystem. This long-term level will nodoubt be less than 50 ppb, and may be in the rangeof 10 ppb. For project details see: http://www.sfwmd.gov/org/erd/ecp/3_ecp.html.

ENP Protection and Expansion Act/ModifiedWater Deliveries

Signed into law in 1989, this bill authorized theaddition of 107,000 acres of the east Everglades toENP. In addition, it authorizedmodifications to theC&SF Project (i.e., the Modified Water DeliveriesProject) ‘‘to improve water deliveries into the parkand shall, to the extent practicable, take steps torestore the natural hydrologic conditions in thePark’’. This effort seeks to make the eastern

Figure 2. Post-drainage Everglades watershed: canal system

and flow paths in the Everglades after flood control and

drainage system construction.

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boundary of the main Everglades corridor, SharkRiver Slough, a part of ENP. Other project objec-tives are to restore water to the historic wetlands inthat area and to restore a more natural timing ofwater to ENP. The Modified Waters DeliveryProject is particularly important, since it seeks toreverse serious declines in freshwater and coastalwetlands in the eastern part of the Park. It consistsprimarily of relocating the water that the C&SFProject moved westward back to the east anddeveloping seepage barriers to avoid flooding po-tential in agricultural production areas that abutthe eastern Park border. The project also seeks toimprove water flow in Taylor River Slough andrestore historic sheetflow to northeast Florida Bay.For details see: http://www.saj.usace.army.mil/dp/MWDC111.htm.

Critical projects

These are a number of small projects, termed‘‘critical projects’’ by the US Army Corps thatdesigned primarily to improve water regulationcontrol or to improve water quality in the watermanagement system. The emphasis for the waterquality improvement projects in this group is re-moval of phosphorus that results from agriculturein the Everglades watershed. For details see: http://www.saj.usace.army.mil/projects/index.htm.

Multi-species Recovery Plan

This goal of this plan, developed by the US Fishand Wildlife Service in 1999, is to recover 68threatened and endangered species found in southFlorida, and to restore and maintain biodiversityof native plants and animals in the 19 counties insouth Florida. For details see: http://vero-beach.fws.gov/Programs/Recovery/vbms5.html.

State, Federal, and Non-governmental Organization(NGO) land acquisition

One of the oldest conservation and environmentalrestoration techniques is the acquisition of privateland for that purpose. The state of Florida hasseveral active state land acquisition programs,including the Conservation and Recreation Lands(CARL) program and the Land Acquisition TrustFund (LATF) programs. Important to Everglades

restoration, these programs have budgets over$300 million annually statewide to purchase envi-ronmentally sensitive areas and land that can beused as a buffer to the Everglades. Additionally,the acquisition of land by the Federal government(as in the Everglades Expansion and ProtectionAct, 1989) also plays a significant role. Criticalland purchases in sensitive areas in South Floridahave also been made by NGOs, such as theAudubon Society and the Nature Conservancy. Ina number of cases, land acquisition is much lessexpensive than the long-term cost of flood control,especially in historical wetlands in proximity to theEverglades. Land acquisition has also become acritical factor in developing both long term andshort term water storage areas for restorationpurposes.

Elements of the CERP

Flood control has always been a major issue inSouth Florida, and the extensive flooding fromtwo hurricanes in the 1930s provided most of theimpetus for the CS&F Project. However, theresulting flood control system and subsequent landuse has removed the capacity for storage of waterthat is needed by both the natural system and theexpanding urban populations at the edge of theEverglades. One of the major goals in CERP, torestore the quantity of water available throughoutthe year, is posed by a regional annual weatherpattern that alternates between very little rainfallin the dry season and over 60 in. during the wetseason. Tropical storms and hurricanes in the wetseason create intense periods of rainfall, and withthe low relief of the landscape make flooding anatural consequence. The historic Everglades sys-tem dynamically ‘‘stored’’ water as it came fromLake Okeechobee; that is, wetland forests andmarshes held water back by creating resistance toflow, aided by the low gradient of the landscape.Rainfall and water that spilled past Lake Oke-echobee in the wet season charged surface andground water systems, and then took severalmonths to drain seaward, maintaining the hydro-period in downstream and coastal wetlands forpart of the dry season (Fig. 1). However, with theadvent of regional drainage and water manage-ment, over 500,000 acres of wetlands south of

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Lake Okeechobee were drained and became theEAA. The loss of natural wetland vegetation re-sulted in the loss of dynamic storage, and the needto maintain conditions for agricultural productioneliminated a significant amount of surface areaavailable for impoundment storage of water. Aprinciple goal of Everglades restoration is there-fore to replace that lost capacity for retention andstorage of much of the water that is currentlydischarged to the Gulf of Mexico and the AtlanticOcean by the C&SF Project. In addition, thegeology of South Florida, particularly the Ever-glades, allows for relatively high rates of ground-water movement. In order to keep wetlands wetand developed areas dry, CERP includes ground-water or seepage control projects to improve wet-land water retention.

The CERP proposes to capture most of thiswater in surface and underground storage areaswhere it will be stored until it is needed. Specifi-cally, this water will be stored in more than217,000 acres of new reservoirs and wetlands-based treatment areas and 300 undergroundaquifer storage and recovery (ASR) wells. Resi-dence time there may be from 2 to 4 years before itis recovered. Some of the new reservoirs will con-sist of limestone mining pits, after mining is com-pleted, although it is not clear how these wouldfunction unless they can be sealed off from theBiscayne aquifer, which provides the drinkingwater for much of South Florida. Of the waterstored by CERP, it is proposed that 80% would goto the environment and 20% will be used to add tourban and agricultural water supplies. Shouldwater storage projects fail to meet assumedquantities, percentages would be less. There hasbeen no assurance as yet that the state of Florida,to whom the water belongs, will allocate capturedwater in these proportions, particularly if waterstorage projects ultimately yield less water thananticipated. Key issues related to the goal ofincreasing water storage is the quality of waterbeing stored, the extent and type of treatmentprior to storage, and the effects of storage, par-ticularly for the ASR technique (National Re-search Council, 2002).

The system is now highly compartmentalized, sowhen water is provided to the Everglades, it is re-ferred to as ‘‘delivered’’, much as the SFWMD‘‘delivers’’ water to a water user. Delivery timing

for the natural system is very poor at present, withwater withheld from the southern Everglades dur-ing the dry season for water supply, and dischargedto the Everglades during the wet season in an effortto reduce flooding in the developed areas. Anothermain goal of CERP is to improve the timing ofwater delivery to the Everglades, with a more nat-ural hydropattern as a target. The areas that haveexperienced significant problems as a result of theC&SF are those downstream: the estuaries east andwest of Lake Okeechobee, the southern Everglades,and the estuaries and bays of the lower east coast(Biscayne Bay and Florida Bay). The salinity re-gimes of the coastal areas have been adversely af-fected, resulting in damaged fish habitat and fisheryresources (USACE, 1998). So another principlegoal of restoration is to improve the timing offreshwater deliveries to the natural system. Spe-cifically, the timing of water held, released, ormoved between water management compartmentswill be modified in an attempt to more closelymatch natural patterns. CERP proposes to modifythe operation of the water delivery system to pro-vide a more natural hydrologic pattern to theEverglades and coastal estuaries. To improve theconnectivity of natural areas, and to enhancesheetflow, more than 240 miles of levees and canalswill be removed within the Everglades. Most of theMiami Canal in Water Conservation Area 3 will beremoved and 20 miles of the Tamiami Trail (USRoute 41) will be rebuilt with bridges and culverts,allowing water to flow more naturally into ENP. Inthe Big Cypress National Preserve, the levee thatseparates the Preserve from the Everglades will beremoved to restore more natural overland waterflow as that water moves to the Gulf coast of ENP.

Another main goal in CERP is to improve thequality of water reaching the Everglades, sincewater quality throughout south Florida has dete-riorated over the past 50 years. High nutrient con-centrations in agriculture and urban runoff posesignificant problems for the Everglades, which ischaracterized as a low nutrient, oligotrophic eco-system. With the loss of over 50% of the wetlandsthat acted as natural filters and retention areas,assimilative capacity has been significantly reduced.Lake Okeechobee has become eutrophic, andaccording to the 1996 305(b) report (FloridaDepartment of Environmental Protection, 1996),the major pollution sources for the lake include

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runoff from ranch and dairy operations in the northwhere pollution has elevated phosphorus and coli-form bacteria concentrations and created a con-tinuous algal bloom. Other pollutants include highlevels of total dissolved solids, un-ionized ammo-nia, chloride, color, and dissolved organic chemi-cals. Pollution from the EAA and urban areas hasresulted in poor water quality with extremely highnutrient and low dissolved oxygen levels, particu-larly in canals. Other problems include pesticides,BOD, bacteria, and suspended solids (FDEP,1996). For a general discussion of water quality insouth Florida, refer to the reports by the SFWMD,which are compiled in their annual EvergladesConsolidated Report (http://www.sfwmd.gov/org/ema/everglades/index.html).

Water quality and Everglades restoration

As part of the Everglades Forever Act, the state ofFlorida is in the process of constructing wetlands totreat agricultural runoff as part of the pre-CERPEverglades Construction Project. CERP is also in-tended to improve the quality of water dischargedto natural areas by first directing it to surface stor-age reservoirs and additional wetlands-based STAs.The degree to which this is successful will depend onthe availability of water detention area acreage,how these detention areas are managed, and theresidence time that is important for sequestration ofnutrients and contaminants. There are additionalwater treatment projects proposed in CERP,mainly through water detention in managed wet-lands and reservoirs, to reduce the nutrient loadingto Lake Okeechobee. A continuing issue is thepractice of backpumping for flood control in urbanand agricultural areas. Stormwater runoff fromthese areas has very poor quality and is dischargedeither into the Everglades or Lake Okeechobee.Under drought conditions, water from urban run-off, despite problems with water quality, has beenbackpumped to Lake Okeechobee to raise lakelevels to meet water supply demands.

While CERP has addressed the restoration of thehydrologic regime in the Everglades more compre-hensively, the water quality component of both pre-CERP and CERP projects have largely focused onreducing eutrophication through control of phos-phorus in constructedwetlands. The issue of control

of mercury contamination in South Florida stillremains a major issue, along with the ecologicalimpacts of agrochemical use in the Everglades wa-tershed. Since the initial detection of elevated levelsof mercury in freshwater fish in 1989 (Ware et al.,1990), it has become increasingly apparent thatSouth Florida has an extensive mercury contami-nation problem. The State of Florida has issuedhuman health fish consumption advisories due tomercury contamination that either ban or restrictthe consumption of largemouth bass and otherfreshwater species from over two million acresencompassing the Everglades and Big Cypress Na-tional Preserve. The maximum concentrationsfound in largemouth bass (4.4 mg/kg) and bowfin(over 7 mg/kg) collected from theEverglades are thehighest concentrations found in Florida to date.Mercury contamination has also been found atlevels of concern in largemouth bass throughoutFlorida’s surface waters (Lange et al., 1993). Mer-cury accumulation through the food web may re-duce the breeding success of wading birds(Frederick and Spalding, 1994) and the viability ofthe endangered Florida panther (Roelke et al.,1991).Additional discussion on the issue ofmercuryaffecting the Everglades may be found in USACE(1996).

A number of other water quality and contami-nant issues remain largely unresolved. The use ofaquifers for storage of surface water, primarilyaround Lake Okeechobee, is critical to achievingrestoration of water budgets to the natural system.However, there are a number of potential interac-tions between surface water, and the geologicalformations inwhich they are stored that are not wellunderstood. A pilot project is underway, which willevaluate changes in water quality that result fromthis technique. Another controversial water supplytechnique associated with water quality proposedby CERP is water reclamation, termed ‘‘water re-use’’. Over 400,000 acre-feet of reclaimed domesticwastewater annually are proposed by CERP as asource of additional water. It is assumed that ad-vanced techniques in wastewater reclamation willresult in water that meets state water quality stan-dards. Currently, pilot projects are planned toevaluate water quality improvement techniques.Critical issues that remain to be addressed includethe fate and potential effects of low concentrationsof contaminants, especially those that are known to

South Florida Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan 191

have endocrine activity in wildlife, have not beenaddressed. The number of observations of aberrantendocrine functions in both human and wildlifepopulations in Florida and elsewhere that could beexplained by contaminants operating as endocrinedisrupters (Colborn et al., 1993) highlights theimportance of the role of contaminants inattempting to restore the Everglades.

At present, only nutrient removal is being ad-dressed as a treatment means; however, there are anumber of critical issues concerning fates of met-als, pathogens, and other contaminants found indomestic effluent that will need to be resolved be-fore treated water will be suitable for release intoan urban waterbody that supports a significantcommercial and recreational fishery.

There are similar risk concerns for the potentialeffects of latent contaminants on land purchasesfor restoration; these will total over 110,000 acresin the eastern Everglades, the EAA south of LakeOkeechobee, and land in the Okeechobee wa-tershed. Most of these lands were drained wetlandsor prone to flooding and will be returned to awetland state or converted to impoundments toremove nutrients. Lands that have had agriculturepresent significant concerns related to both chronicand acute toxicity to wildlife and fish thatreoccupy those areas. The potential effects of lowconcentrations of organphosphates and orga-nochlorines pesticides, and the triazine herbicidesin the restoration effort are issues that remain to befully evaluated or addressed. The challenges posedby the potential impacts of contaminants intro-duced into the Everglades from human activitymay well exceed those of hydrological restorationin South Florida.

Summary

Overall, Everglades restoration projects are in-tended to restore a more natural hydropattern, im-prove water quality, and provide additional watersupply and flood control capacity to developedareas. To accomplish this, additional water storageis required, a challenging objective in a flat land-scape with high groundwater seepage rates andlimited space. The geochemistry of water storedunderground is uncertain, with the degree of pre-storage treatment an important economic issue and

potential for groundwater contamination animportant technical issue. A commitment to at leastpartly decompartmentalize the system has beenmade; however, this further increases the complex-ity of water management, especially between thecompeting interests of flood control and ecosystemrestoration. Wastewater re-use, proposed to pro-vide additional available water, is still in the con-ceptual stage. Even if suitable advanced treatmenttechnology can achieve acceptable water quality, itremains to be seen if it can be accomplished witheconomy sufficient to receive the public support andfunding that will be required for implementation onthe scale proposed. Water regulation and manage-ment is and will be controlled by gates, canals, andpumps, which permit water to be moved around thesystem in relatively short timeframes. The potentialfor transfer of poor quality water (i.e., nutrients andcontaminants) fromdeveloped areas into remainingnatural areas thus increases the risk of adverse im-pacts to the Everglades ecosystem. The system iseven more widely connected under high dischargeconditions imposed by tropical storms and hurri-canes, when runoff from South Florida may extendits reach to the Florida Keys and its reef tracts.Ultimately, water in South Florida and the con-stituents it carries reach the coastal marshes, estu-aries, and bays around the southern tip of Florida,whether through a restored Everglades or throughcanals. Water quality impacts from agriculture,urban development, and an expanding populationpose significant eutrophication and contaminantrisks to coastal Everglades fish and wildlife, evenwithout the goal of Everglades restoration. Thelong-term success of restoration plans and the sus-tainability of hoped-for ecological improvementwill depend on our ability to manage water qualityas well as restore hydrology in South Florida.

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