NUTRIENTS - Marine Pollution: What Everyone Needs to Know - page 35

identified. The number of reported outbreaks of PSP increased
from fewer than 20 in 1970 to more than 100 in 2009. However,
some of the apparent increases may be due to increased
surveillance.
Efforts are under way to improve detection, so it can be done
in real time directly in the ocean. An optical sensor called the
BrevBuster can measure K. brevis and beam the information
back to shore via satellite. A technology that could be used
for more algal species is the environmental sample processor
(ESP), a robotic lab that collects water samples, extracts and
sequences DNA, and transmits the results back to shore. It will
provide an accurate, fast, and cheap method to detect HAB
cells and their toxins.
What can be done to reduce farm runoff?
Inputs from agriculture can be reduced by using certain types
of tillage that reduce runoff and planting buffer strips or trees
along stream edges to absorb runoff. There are various farming
techniques that reduce runoff, and incentive programs have
been set up to encourage farmers to adopt them. Boards placed
in farm ditches can block the water in the ditch from enter-
ing the drains. This both reduces the amount of water going
into streams and slows down the water, giving the N more
time to convert to N 2 gas, which dissipates. Reducing fertilizer
use and recycling manure will remove sources of nutrients.
Unlike point sources of pollution, runoff control and reduction
is largely voluntary. There is funding available from the US
Department of Agriculture's Conservation Reserve Program,
which encourages farmers to reduce erosion and runoff from
their farms. Large animal-feeding operations (CAFOs)—the
huge sheds containing hogs and chickens—are supposed
to be regulated as point sources under the Clean Water Act
like factories, but they are not. To control nutrients in runoff,
farmers can implement nutrient management plans, which
optimize crop yields while protecting the environment. These