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Save the Sound released its 2026 Long Island Sound Report Card, showing that water quality improved or remained stable across all five open-water regions of the Sound. The biennial report, based on 2025 monitoring data and detailed on Save the Sound’s own Report Card project page, grades the open Sound using four water quality indicators and 62 bay segments across 46 bays and harbours using five. Save the Sound’s Unified Water Study has supported this work by establishing standardised monitoring procedures, protocols and equipment across 62 of the Sound’s bays and harbours, allowing data collected by different organisations to be reliably compared region-wide.
Save the Sound said continued reductions in nitrogen pollution, along with sustained investment in wastewater and stormwater infrastructure, will be essential to maintaining the results achieved so far. They posted their first passing grade in nearly two decades. Here’s how each region fared, and what’s driving the improvement. Save the Sound attributed the gains largely to billions of dollars in wastewater and infrastructure upgrades across Connecticut and New York, alongside continued reductions in the nitrogen entering the Sound. Excess nitrogen fuels algae blooms and contributes to low-oxygen conditions that can harm or kill fish and other aquatic life, so cutting nitrogen inputs has remained a central focus of the region’s water quality efforts. Despite the improving picture, Save the Sound via Fox Weather cautioned that this progress could still be undone. The organisation pointed to climate change, rising water temperatures and worsening stormwater runoff as ongoing threats to the Sound’s recovery.
The standout finding indicated the historically worst-performing region, the Western Narrows near New York City.
