The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has launched a two-year study of Illinois River water pollution. 

The total maximum daily load (TMDL) study is expected to set limits for pollutants that hurt the river’s water quality, safety, and recreational value. Wisely, EPA will approach the study by looking at the entire watershed, not at the singular interests of Arkansas or Oklahoma. 

Phosphorus most certainly will be an object of any TMDLs for the Illinois River watershed.  From 2000 to 2004, it’s estimated that between 391,000 to 712,000 pounds of phosphorous entered Tenkiller Lake. Phosphorus does not disappear and is recycled from lake sediments for use over and over by algae.

If you will kindly indulge a comparison to a crime scene investigation on a popular television show, you might think of a TMDL study as “CSI: Illinois River.” Imagine forensic investigators pouring over DNA evidence and spraying luminol up and down the Illinois River, setting the entire watershed aglow.  The telltale bright green, which indicates blood on TV, will instead point to evidence of phosphorus, the nutrient that promotes the growth of algae. In great amounts, algae degrade water clarity, rob fish of oxygen, and cause taste and odor problems. Some algae can even be toxic to humans, pets and livestock.

Complicating this crime scene is the fact that investigators in Arkansas and Oklahoma are not looking in the same box of evidence. Oklahoma water quality agencies conduct tests at normal, base flow, river conditions as well as during storm events called peak flow. Arkansas abandoned this type of testing, opting instead to test only at base flow conditions. This explains why phosphorus levels are several times greater at Watts, on our border, than they are just upstream in Arkansas.

Eliminating peak flow testing ignores phosphorus carried from fields, yards and parking lots by stormwater runoff. Runoff accounts for an estimated 78 percent of the phosphorus load entering Lake Tenkiller. The bulk of phosphorus in runoff is from animal feeding operations and in our region, this means chicken and cattle manure spread on pastures surrounding poultry farms. 

When only base flow conditions are sampled, phosphorus from sewage treatment plants, estimated to be about 35 percent of watershed phosphorous, is unfairly emphasized. This has placed Oklahoma water quality agencies at a stalemate, forcing the EPA to conduct the TMDL study.

Oklahoma’s numeric standard for phosphorus is .037 parts per million. It has been compared to an ounce of phosphorus in an Olympic-size swimming pool. The limit has been roundly criticized by farming interests and Arkansas authorities who are lobbying the EPA to relax standards for sewage treatment plants. The .037 standard for the six Oklahoma Scenic Rivers, all originating in Arkansas, must be achieved by 2012. 

Ahead of the pending EPA TMDL, the mood of many of our neighbors to the east is one of great anxiety because Oklahoma pledged to re-evaluate the .037 limit before 2012. Recent studies by the USGS seem to show that Oklahoma .037 phosphorus limit still is viable despite claims by Arkansas leaders that it’s unachievable and would curtail northwest Arkansas’ economy. 

Oklahoma has attempted to get at nonpoint pollution sources, which, unlike municipalities, are unregulated by federal law. A verdict in a U.S. District Court lawsuit filed by Oklahoma against Arkansas poultry companies is being awaited. Poultry industry giants including Tyson and Simmons Foods defended their activities and blamed others, including cities, for the huge amount of phosphorus in the Illinois River watershed.

The comparison of an Illinois River watershed TMDL study to a crime scene investigation may not be far-fetched. What’s missing are the long, fluttering barriers of bright yellow crime scene tape and detectives with bottles of magic fluid used to find blood traces. The cops on the beat, EPA, Oklahoma, and Arkansas, have allowed the Illinois River to slide into decay by not establishing TMDLs, which are required by the federal Clean Water Act passed more than 30 years ago. 

What has happened to the once clear Illinois River and Tenkiller Lake is a crime, and it’s time we get to the bottom of it.

Brocksmith is a former commissioner on the Oklahoma Scenic Rivers Commission.