Where does your Wastewater go?
Dr Anjani Ganase reminds us that what drains from our islands ends up in the sea. How do we ensure that we do not enrich the coastal waters with chemicals and pollutants from agriculture, manufacturing and yes, household use. All drains lead to the ocean, but do we think about this when we wash our cars, do our laundry, clean our dishes? Nutrient pollution is caused by the nitrates and phosphate compounds that flush into rivers and coastal marine environment from the use of agricultural fertilisers, discharge of high volumes of greywater, and industrial effluent. Nutrient pollution is a growing issue impacting our waterways and the ocean with unforeseen consequences. At the global scale it is rapidly becoming a major concern given the many other large-scale issues that are plaguing regions of the world. Most noticeably, in the Caribbean we see the rise of sargassum blooms in the southern Atlantic, the presence of harmful algal blooms in the northern Caribbean and the expansion...