South Florida’s Toxic Summer

Last summer, Florida’s Treasure Coast found itself under siege by an unusual enemy: a noxious, guacamole-like cyanobacterium, more commonly known as blue-green algae, which had overrun waterways and contaminated many local beaches.

The invasive algae showed up after a particularly rainy El Niño winter, when billions of gallons of water from Lake Okeechobee were released into the Indian River Lagoon System, eventually entering the St. Lucie River Estuary en route to the Atlantic. Fresh nitrogenand phosphorous-rich water coupled with increasingly warm summer temperatures created the ideal conditions for algal growth. Within months, putrid-smelling slime was washing up onto Treasure Coast beaches, prompting Florida Governor Rick Scott to issue an executive order declaring an emergency