2014 Beach Report: 'Superstar' Seashores & Worst 'Repeat Offenders'

Surfer on the Beach — (Image credit: joyfull | Shutterstock.com)

A newly released report that graded the water quality of beaches across the United States found that 10 percent of the country's shores are contaminated or polluted.

The annual beach report, conducted by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), discovered that one in 10 beaches in the coastal and Great Lakes region of the United States did not meet the Environmental Protection Agency's recommended standards for safe swimming.

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In addition to these troubling finds, the report identified 35 "superstar" beaches and 17 "repeat offenders." The NRDC singled out the superstar beaches for consistently scoring high with national water quality benchmarks — with samples meeting safety standards 98 percent of the time — over the past five years. The repeat offenders were so-named because sections of these seashores have had persistent pollution problems — with water samples failing to meet safety standards more than 25 percent of the time — over the past five years, according to the NRDC.

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Denise Chow was the assistant managing editor at Live Science before moving to NBC News as a science reporter, where she focuses on general science and climate change. Before joining the Live Science team in 2013, she spent two years as a staff writer for Space.com, writing about rocket launches and covering NASA's final three space shuttle missions. A Canadian transplant, Denise has a bachelor's degree from the University of Toronto, and a master's degree in journalism from New York University.