Scientists researching the causes and effects of hypoxia in Green Bay, part of Lake Michigan, Wisc., have been awarded $348,037 for the first year of an anticipated four-year $1,367,300 project through NOAA's Coastal Hypoxia Research Program. Hypoxia within Green Bay has been a problem for decades, and recent evidence suggests that it may be worsening, with the potential for "dead zones" and fish kills to become both more frequent and more extensive with a changing climate.
Hypoxia is a condition in which dissolved oxygen levels in water become too low to support most life. While hypoxia can occur naturally, it is often caused by excess nutrients from human activities such as agriculture and urban stormwater runoff, which stimulate algal blooms. These blooms of algae decompose through the action of bacteria that deplete oxygen from the water, and in the process, negatively affect the growth, reproduction, and survival of organisms exposed to the low oxygen conditions.
Green Bay is particularly vulnerable to hypoxia because one-third of the watershed of Lake Michigan drains into it, and it receives approximately one-third of the total amount of nutrients draining into the lake.