[matsemann]

We can also swim in Oslo, but it's threatened:

* Farmers having runaway water with lots of nutrition makes algae bloom * Hotter summer also lead to more algae * More unstable climate with flash rain makes sewage seep out into the fjord when the water handling stations can't handle the flow * Fishing boats are destroying the sea bed

If this isn't turned around, our nice fjord will soon be dead, and possibly not safe to use.

[AdamN]

Yeah there's this focus on cities where things are getting cleaned up but in rural areas the fertilizer and intensive agriculture makes the rivers (and fjords?) toxic. Check out the Des Moines river in Iowa. Seems absolutely insane that a rich and ostensibly well-run country like Norway isn't prioritizing health and environmental safety for its citizens.

[bluGill]

While city folks like to blame farmers for the problems in Iowa, the soil in Iowa naturally makes nitrates which runs off into the streams after every rain. We have death reports from the early 1800s that on rereading with a modern eye make it clear that the problem was drinking water with high nitrates. This is both what makes Iowa such great farm country, and what makes streams harmful.

Not that fertilizer isn't making things worse (though sometimes it makes things better - farmers don't want their expensive fertilizer to wash away and so look for ways to keep it on the field), but it isn't the whole story.