Advocates of the state’s widest-spread and fastest-with-data water quality monitoring system are feeling frustrated by a lack of state support, and say appropriations that did make it through the legislative process won’t help every Iowan. The Iowa Legislature went back and forth on funding for water quality during the final days and hours of its […]
Iowa Water Quality Information System
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More than 700 Iowa water segments are impaired, according to a new state report
The Iowa Department of Natural Resources released a draft version of its 2026 biennial integrated report Tuesday, which listed more than 700 segments of rivers, lakes or wetlands in the state as impaired. The impaired list looks at retroactive data and determines if a water segment meets, or fails to meet, designated criteria for uses […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Seize the means of water testing with a free kit from Nitrate Watch
I wasn’t great at science in high school. Following a set of basic lab protocols was somehow harder for me than memorizing the entirety of “We Didn’t Start the Fire” by Billy Joel. I scored even worse on the science portion of the ACT than the math portion, which is saying something. That said, I love […]
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With state funding cut off, the Izaak Walton League is fundraising to keep an Iowa water quality monitoring program afloat
The Izaak Walton League of America’s Iowa division has started a grassroots campaign to raise funds for a water quality monitoring program, formerly funded by the state, at the University of Iowa. The Iowa Water Quality Information System, or IWQIS, gives real-time measures of pH, nitrate, dissolved oxygen, discharge rates and temperature in streams across […]
