CLF’s Great Bay–Piscataqua Waterkeeper brings together partners and dozens of volunteers on annual cleanup to remove polluting debris from the estuary’s shoreline.
Clean water is a fundamental human right, and we at CLF are dedicated to defending it.
Fifty years ago, Congress adopted the Clean Water Act. This landmark environmental law aimed to clean up waterways that were too polluted for people to swim in or for fish to survive. That law – and those who have enforced it, like my CLF colleagues – has led to many clean water success stories over the… Continue reading The Clean Water Act, Sewage Pollution, and Clamming in Brave Boat Harbor
Fifty years ago this week, Congress adopted the Clean Water Act, a landmark in environmental legislation aimed at cleaning up many of the nation’s waterways that had become too polluted for people to swim or fish to survive.
What draws you to Great Bay and the Piscataqua River? I’ve lived in New Hampshire’s Seacoast region for years, raised my kids here, and poked around our harbors, salt marshes, and rivers as a sailor and kayaker. Besides this area just being so beautiful, I love the regional history that is written around the water.… Continue reading 5 Questions for Melissa Paly, Great Bay–Piscataqua Waterkeeper
Through a eelgrass restoration pilot project, CLF and our partners hope to learn how to help bring life back to the Great Bay Estuary.
We just launched a pilot project to see if eelgrass harvested in one area can be transplanted successfully in another. What we learn will help us understand if we can jumpstart the recovery of the ecosystem that depends on this underwater plant.
Melissa Paly, the Great Bay-Piscataqua Waterkeeper with the Conservation Law Foundation, said it didn’t help that for years, towns and stakeholders fought over who was responsible and who should pay. Now, they’re finally ready to get to work on more ambitious solutions.
“This has been a long and contentious road to reduce nitrogen pollution in the estuary,” Paly said. “After many, many years, it’s really gratifying to see municipalities coming together, working more collaboratively with CLF and other stakeholders to start down a new path, and hopefully the estuary will be the better for it.”
“Nitrogen pollution is a scourge on our Great Bay estuary, including the many bays and rivers that are part of it,” Melissa Paly, Great Bay-Piscataqua Waterkeeper at CLF, wrote in a separate statement. “This agreement gives the communities surrounding Great Bay flexibility in how they will reduce this harmful pollution, but also accountability to ensure real progress.”
