NORWICH – Under new strict new rules from the Environmental Protection Agency, the City of Norwich is taking financial burdens head-on as the federal agency mandates the city – and hundreds of other municipalities near the east coast – remove significant amounts of phosphorous and nitrogen from water that flows into the Chesapeake Bay.

The initiative comes after a 2010 executive order from President Barack Obama to restore and protect Chesapeake Bay. Large-scale efforts to reduce pollutants in the bay have been ongoing for three decades, but according to the EPA, efforts showed insufficient progress and there’s been a greater push to limit amounts of phosphorous and nitrogen flowing into the bay for the last two years.

Following treatment at the city’s wastewater treatment plant, water is dumped into the Chenango River, where it flows south into the Susquehanna River near Binghamton, which then leads down into the Chesapeake Bay just south of the Pennsylvania border.