Water and Sediment Quality Status and Trends in the Coastal Bend Area- Phase 2: Data Analysis

The Coastal Bend Bays & Estuaries Program (CBBEP) has a goal to identify and address relevant sediment and water quality management questions and scientific approaches to protect estuaries. In order to meet this goal, both the status and trends of sediment and water quality must be known. The purpose of this current project is to provide an updated and improved version of the original and most recent status and trends report for the Texas Coastal Bend, which published data collected prior to 1995 (18 years ago).

Phase I of this current project involved collecting and archiving data from many different state and federal agencies over as many years as possible. This current report outlines Phase II of this project, which is to analyze the data to identify status and trends. A large amount of data (9 million data entries) was collected for 71 sediment variables and 43 water quality variables collected between the 1950’s and 2010. Spatial interpolation of the data allowed the status of the sediment and water quality within the Texas Coastal Bend to be visualized. Trends over time were determined for each variable (where possible) after data were binned into spatial Assessment Units that were previously developed by the Texas Commission of Environmental Quality (TCEQ). The spatial and temporal extent of sampling for each variable was also documented so that the validity of the status and trends can be assessed and needs for further sampling can be determined.