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Water Quality

Several statewide water topics remain issues of concern for communities throughout Southeast Alaska. They include: mining impacts, the lack of a Tier 3 Waters designation process to protect our most outstanding national resource waters here in Alaska, the impacts of cruise ship dumping in our waterways, attempts by state and federal agencies to weaken the protections under the Clean Water Act, and PFAS — a category of toxic chemicals, embedded in many of the products we use, that have contaminated local sources of drinking water in some communities and cause serious health impacts. Click on the options below to learn more about these topics of concern and what you can do to address them.

Cruise Ship Dumping

Understand the impacts of cruise ship dumping in Alaska waters and what you can do about it.

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Tier 3 Protections

The federal Clean Water Act allows Alaska residents to protect waters critical to their communities. But the state does not.

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PFAS Contamination

Learn about PFAS contamination in Alaska waters and what you can do about it.

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Alaska Water Quality Standards

Alaska’s Water Quality Standards are not what they should be. One glaring issue is the use of an irresponsibly low Fish Consumption Rate under the Human Health Criteria used to determine these standards. The State of Alaska uses a rate of just 6.5 grams per day, when we know and the State of Alaska knows Alaskans eat a lot more fish — and shellfish and marine mammals and the list goes on. Water Quality Standards that don’t reflect real consumption rates is a risk to Alaskans’ health. The State of Alaska needs to up its standards using sound science and data. Another issue with the Human Health Criteria? The Cancer Risk Rate is set at 1 in 100,000 — we want to see it set to 1 in 1,000,000, which is not only more in line with national standards, it’s also what’s best for Alaskans.

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