In a recent Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences paper, Drs. Sujay S. Kaushal, Peter M. Groffman, and Gene E. Likens of the Institute of Ecosystem Studies, with colleagues, detail how roadways and deicers are compromising the health of northeastern waters, making them inhospitable to wildlife and compromising drinking water supplies.
There are 2.6 million miles of paved roads in the United States, and new roads are being constructed daily. When parking lots and driveways are factored in, there is already enough blacktopped surface in the U.S. to cover the entire state of Ohio. Paved roads and parking spaces come in handy for our nation's drivers, but they also come with a serious unforeseen cost- the degradation of our nation's freshwater ecosystems.
(You can read the full introduction here (http://www.ecostudies.org/road_salt.html) and download the full PDF article here).