Hot summers raise public awareness of toxic cyanobacterial blooms

TY - JOUR

T1 - Hot summers raise public awareness of toxic cyanobacterial blooms

AU - Van de Waal, Dedmer B.

AU - Gsell, Alena S.

AU - Harris, Ted

AU - Paerl, Hans W.

AU - de Senerpont Domis, Lisette N.

AU - Huisman, Jef

N1 - Data archiving: DataverseNL

PY - 2024/2/1

Y1 - 2024/2/1

N2 - Water quality of eutrophic lakes is threatened by harmful cyanobacterial blooms, which are favored by summer heatwaves and expected to intensify with global warming. Societal demands on surface water for drinking, irrigation and recreation are also highest in summer, especially during dry and warm conditions. Here, we analyzed trends in online searches to investigate how public awareness of cyanobacterial blooms is impacted by temperature in nine different countries over almost twenty years. Our findings reveal large seasonal and interannual variation, with more online searches for harmful cyanobacteria in temperate regions during hot summers. Online searches and media attention increased even more steeply with temperature than the incidence of cyanobacterial blooms, presumably because lakes attract more people during warm weather. Overall, our study indicates that warmer summers not only increase cyanobacterial bloom incidence, but also lead to a pronounced increase of the public awareness of toxic cyanobacterial blooms.

AB - Water quality of eutrophic lakes is threatened by harmful cyanobacterial blooms, which are favored by summer heatwaves and expected to intensify with global warming. Societal demands on surface water for drinking, irrigation and recreation are also highest in summer, especially during dry and warm conditions. Here, we analyzed trends in online searches to investigate how public awareness of cyanobacterial blooms is impacted by temperature in nine different countries over almost twenty years. Our findings reveal large seasonal and interannual variation, with more online searches for harmful cyanobacteria in temperate regions during hot summers. Online searches and media attention increased even more steeply with temperature than the incidence of cyanobacterial blooms, presumably because lakes attract more people during warm weather. Overall, our study indicates that warmer summers not only increase cyanobacterial bloom incidence, but also lead to a pronounced increase of the public awareness of toxic cyanobacterial blooms.

KW - Blue-green algae

KW - Climate change

KW - Global warming

KW - Online searches

KW - Societal impact

KW - cyanoHABs

U2 - 10.1016/j.watres.2023.120817

DO - 10.1016/j.watres.2023.120817

M3 - Article

SN - 0043-1354

VL - 249

JO - Water Research

JF - Water Research

M1 - 120817

ER -