Blue-Green Alage Bloom again in Dianchi Lake and new Daring Use of Water Hyacinth

I went to observe restoration efforts for Dianchi Lake in Kunming City, Yunnan Province while in China in July after giving water-environment lectures in GuangDong Province. The blue-green algae bloomed again, an every-year occurrence since 80's. I was told the lake water quality started to turn bad since the city was expanded and the raw sewage was collected and channeled into the lake. Much effort has been put into restoring the lake water quality with some success. The latest effort was to introduce water hyacinth into the lake (and its tributaries) to uptake nutrients from the water. Although water hyacinth is efficient in uptaking phosphorus and nitrogen from water, it can quickly grow out of control jamming the entire water surface. It was thus cultivated in the fenced-off areas and planned to be harvested (and beneficially-used) in a timely fashion. Lets hope for the best.

Photo to the left shows that entire water surface was covered by blue-green algae with the presence of introduced water hyacinth.

Rest of the photos that I took can be found in my algae bloom photo album and my water hyacinth photo album.