2024-07-09
Water quality standards: Costs and benefits
Minnesota’s lakes, rivers, and streams are valuable public resources. In addition to being powerful symbols of our state, they provide drinking water, recreational opportunities, wildlife habitat, water for agriculture and industrial uses, and more. These waters, which support many species of fish, invertebrates, plants and wildlife, provide valuable services or benefits to people called "ecosystem services" (see the Millennium Ecosystem Services Report on Ecosystems and Human Well-being).Federal and state laws regulate water quality to protect these beneficial uses. Water quality standards specify the conditions water must meet to protect those specific uses. Measuring lakes and rivers against water quality standards shows which bodies of water need restoration and protection, and dictates how we set limits on pollutant discharges from public and private facilities. Developing, implementing, and enforcing water quality standards is expensive for state agencies, local governments, businesses, and taxpayers. But the standards benefit the state by protecting Minnesota's lakes, rivers, and streams, and by sustaining the ecosystem services that Minnesotans value so highly.