Upper Pascagoula Water Quality Enhancement Project (Project ID: 96)

After the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, federal and state agencies came together to form the Deepwater Horizon Natural Resource Damage Assessment Trustee Council. The Council studied the effects of the oil spill and continues to pursue projects intended to restore the Gulf of Mexico to the condition it would have been in if the spill had not happened. The Trustee Implementation Groups will develop restoration projects and plans to accomplish the significant work needed for the Gulf. Development of these projects is guided by the programmatic restoration plan finalized in 2016 as part of a legal settlement with BP for up to $8.8 billion.

The Upper Pascagoula River Water Quality Enhancement project will help restore injuries to water quality by developing and implementing conservation plans and practices to reduce nutrient and sediment runoff into coastal waters from the Chunky-Okatibbee watersheds. The health of the Gulf of Mexico depends on the health of its estuaries, and the health of those estuaries is influenced by land use upstream along tributary rivers. This project will improve water quality impacted by the spill and benefit marine resources. These watersheds were selected for the project based on the sediment load contributions to coastal waters. The project will provide outreach and technical assistance to voluntary participants (landowners) to develop conservation plans within a 20,000-acre area. Conservation practices, especially those systems that avoid, control, and trap nutrient and sediment losses, will be implemented on cropland, pasture/grassland, forestland, and associated agriculture land within the Chunky-Okatibbee watersheds. United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is the lead Implementing Trustee for the project working with fellow Implementing Trustees Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The project will be implemented in Clarke, Kemper, Lauderdale, Neshoba, and Newton counties.

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The user is responsible for the results of any application of this metadata for other than its intended purpose.

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