Researchers find wetlands destruction linked to algal blooms

Canada's current wetland protection efforts have overlooked how the environment naturally protects fresh-water resources from agricultural

fertilizer contaminants, engineering researchers from the University of Waterloo's Water Institute have found.

In a recent study, Nandita Basu, a civil and environmental engineering professor, and Fred Cheng, a doctoral candidate in civil and environmental engineering at Waterloo, discovered small wetlands have a more significant role to play than larger ones in preventing excess nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus from fertilizer from reaching waterbodies such as the Great Lakes. [Full story]