Jordan Pond Water Quality Project

Encompassing 45,000 acres on the rugged coast of Maine, Acadia National Park, with more than three million visitors each year, is one of the most popular national parks in the U.S. It is also one of the smallest and most vulnerable.

Jordan Pond, often referred to as one of the “crown jewels” of Acadia National Park, is one of the clearest lakes in Maine and it serves as a water supply for the Town of Mount Desert. It is estimated that about 60% of park visitors see the pond during their visit. In recent years, water clarity in Jordan Pond has been declining, a trend that is also occurring in other Maine lakes, and other changes are occurring in the pond’s water chemistry and physical properties in response to improving air quality, extreme weather events, long-term climate shifts, and increasing park visitation.

In 2013 Friends of Acadia began funding the Jordan Pond Water Quality Project, which is implemented by the Acadia National Park Air-Water Resource team and researchers from the University of Maine’s Climate Change Institute. The project builds upon over five decades of long-term monitoring and scientific studies, with goals to better understand the intricate workings of the pond’s complex ecosystem and promote stewardship and science-based protection for this iconic resource. A high-resolution water quality monitoring buoy that collects hundreds of measurements each day is moored at the deepest location in Jordan Pond (over 150 feet deep!), providing the data to support these efforts.

On this website you can learn more about the project, read blog posts about the latest news, access live data, and see pictures from the history of the project.