Monitoring and evaluation of aquatic resource health and use suitability in Tennessee Valley Authority reservoirs

摘要

TVA initiated a Reservoir Monitoring Program in 1990 with two objectives -- to evaluate the health of the reservoir ecosystem and to examine how well each reservoir meets the swimmable and fishable goals of the Clean Water Act. In 1990 reservoir health was evaluated subjectively using a weight-of-evidence approach (a reservoir was deemed healthy if most of the physical, chemical, and biological monitoring components appeared healthy). In the second year (1991) a more objective, quantitative approach was developed using information on five important indicators of reservoir health -- dissolved oxygen, chlorophyll, sediment quality, benthic macroinvertebrates, and fishes. The most recent information (1992) was evaluated with the same basic approach, modified to incorporate improvements based on comments from reviewers and additional data. Reservoirs were stratified into two groups for evaluation: run-of-the-river reservoirs and tributary storage reservoirs. Key locations are sampled in each reservoir (forebay, transition zone or midreservoir, inflow, and major embayments) for most or all of these five reservoir health indicators. For each indicator (or metric), scoring criteria have been developed that assign a score ranging from 1 to 5 representing poor to good conditions, respectively. Scores for the metrics at a location are summed and then the sums for all locations are totaled. Each reservoir has one to four sample locations depending on reservoir characteristics. The resultant total is divided by the maximum possible score (all metrics good at all locations) for the reservoir. Thus, the possible range of scores is from 20 percent (all metrics poor) to 100 percent (all metrics good). This reservoir ecological health evaluation method is proving to be a valuable tool for providing the public with information about the condition of the Valley's reservoirs, for allowing meaningful comparisons among reservoirs, and for tracking changes in reservoir health with time.