Federal hydrologists first named urbanization a major sediment-pollution cause

Evidence

Because the survey had a strong interest in water quality, the hydrologists studying urban erosion often defined sediment as a form of water pollution. The point was not entirely new. In the 1940s, a number of people interested in the fate of the nation’s waters began to write about sediment pollution. But the earlier studies of the problem focused on erosion from farming, ranching, logging, and mining – the survey scientists were the first people to point to urbanization as a major cause of sediment pollution. — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside, 822

Categorization

• XREF: Supports the cross-course thread that federal scientific agencies, not just activists, first sounded suburban environmental alarms (see ch8). — connects to: Scientific framing of sediment as pollution drove the definitional shift leading to regulation — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside:…, 822; The top US hydrologist named urbanization a defining environmental problem by 1961 — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside:…, 869; Federal scientific agencies actively pioneered, not merely followed, suburban environmental awareness — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside:…, 854

Broader Connections

• The top US hydrologist named urbanization a defining environmental problem by 1961 #corroborates (0.88) — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside, 869
• Federal scientific agencies actively pioneered, not merely followed, suburban environmental awareness #expands (0.82) — Adam Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside, 854