Research Product

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is initiating an Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program (EMAP) to monitor the status and trends of the nation's near coastal waters, forests, freshwater wetlands, surface waters, and agroecosystems. This program is also intended to evaluate the effectiveness of Agency policies at protecting ecological resources occurring in these systems. Monitoring data collected for all ecosystems will be integrated for national status and trends evaluations. The near coastal component of EMAP consists of four ecosystem categories: estuaries, wetlands, coastal waters, and Great Lakes. Near coastal ecosystems will be regionalized and classified, an integrated sampling strategy designed, and quality assurance/quality control procedures and data base management procedures implemented. A pilot study will be conducted in one region of the country, followed by a full-scale national implementation.