You can still get your drink on

This outbreak, possibly fed by the above mentioned pollutants, could signify not just an increase in pollution concentration but also a decrease in total water volume. If you had sufficient water volume and sufficient circulation from Lake Tai's sources, through the lake and into Suzhou creek, there might be no or less severe blooms.

But look at the big picture, China just has less water due to nature and wasteful usage. Saltwater seepage into the Yangtze and the Yangtze delta's underground aquifers shows that there is less freshwater in the region so salt water exerts a higher pressure and fills in the gaps.

China is just falling apart with this water issue.

I haven't seen any report that touches on the cause of this unusually early and large algae outbreak. Sure they do happen every year it sounds like, but typically algae really go wild in waters with high phosphate level which can be result of both industrial and residential water pollution. Most detergent and say shampoo can cause that for example. Anyone knows if this is an indication that 太湖 is just just extra polluted this year?