Years of Hopeful Changes

On August 8, 1981, the National Aquarium opened its doors to much pomp and circumstance—we had a marching band and everything. The Aquarium was meant to show how "water wove life's strands together" and generate a new appreciation for how interconnected nature is. During those early years, guests heard harbor seals bellowing from their outdoor exhibit on Pier 3, saw beluga whales swimming in Blue Wonders and touched sea stars in tiny touchpools on Level 4. Since then, much has changed.

Over the last 43 years, the Aquarium has evolved. Our adaptations can be seen in everything from our building expansions and exhibit reimaginings to our educational programs, habitat restoration efforts and advocacy work. Before we look at what lies on the horizon, here's a look back at some key ways we've changed.

Getting Creative with Construction

Space is at a premium on the Inner Harbor and has often dictated our structural changes. The Aquarium's successful splash meant thoughts of expanding were already swirling by 1984. Within two years, Pier 4 became the construction site for the first and biggest expansion. By 1990, Pier 4 and the Marine Mammal Pavilion (what would become Dolphin Discovery in 1992) opened, addressing the need for larger habitats for marine mammals. Nearly Pier 3's opposite in ambiance, it more than doubled the total water volume in the building and housed both dolphins and belugas for a time.

The second expansion came nearly 15 years later when we transformed a manicured green space by the original Pier 3 entrance into the glass pavilion, home to Australia: Wild Extremes. Instead of a lawn, we retained greenery in the form of the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Waterfront Park. Both spaces transport guests: one to the other side of the planet to experience the outback; the other to Maryland's biomes, encouraging visitors to explore and appreciate the beauty of our state's flora and fauna.

The challenges didn't stop at exterior expansions—many difficulties presented themselves as we redesigned interior spaces, too. Often, these challenges were thanks to one primary material: concrete. The building's iconic look, inside and out, meant teams often had to get creative with fewer options. Take the Amazon River Forest, for example. Planning and Design, Exhibit Fabrication and Life Support teams had their hands full, trying to reconfigure a strip of hallway that had housed the Children's Cove touchpools and a behind-the-scenes dive locker. After some intense architectural and plumbing-related Tetris, this reimagined habitat opened in 2000. (The touchpools found their current home in 2015 with the opening of Living Seashore on Level 3.)

Keeping with Our Conservation Goals

Our adaptations haven't been limited to structural ones, either. Many have been behavioral, too. Over the last 50 years, the zoo and aquarium landscape has shifted, with organizations gradually merging entertainment with education and emphasizing the importance of conservation. At the Aquarium that has meant putting our words into action and leading by example.

From the moment guests step onto Aquarium grounds, they are surrounded by ways we're working to achieve our conservation goals. The Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Waterfront Park, for example, has been a Certified Wildlife Habitat since 2012. It is home to native Maryland plants and has provided food and shelter to hundreds of animals over the years. Habitat restoration is something guests can do, too! From balcony to school or community gardens, inspired guests can grow their own certified Gardens for Wildlife and help replenish resources for local wildlife.

Our commitment to conserving resources can be seen throughout our buildings, too, if you know where to look. For the National Aquarium, positioned at the headwaters of a brackish estuary, water is incredibly costly since we have to make and filter enormous amounts of it for exhibits. One of the easiest ways to conserve water is to recycle and thoroughly clean it. So, in 2010, the Life Support staff developed and installed a novel addition to the filtration system for Atlantic Coral Reef, Shark Alley and Wings in the Water (the precursor to Blacktip Reef). Specifically, they added a denitrification system, a technology more often seen in wastewater treatment plants. It harnessed the power of specific bacteria to turn harmful nitrates from fish waste into harmless nitrogen gas. Today, this system saves the Aquarium almost three-quarters of a million gallons of water annually. Combining this system's savings with the water recovery and recycling process used in the biggest exhibits, the Aquarium saved over 11.5 million gallons of water last year alone.

The outdoor seal exhibit of the 1980s and 90s has also helped with water conservation. During the glass pavilion's construction in 2003, the pool was converted into an underground cistern. It now stores rainwater collected from the expansion's rooftops. Last year, it provided almost 200,000 gallons of water for the Harry and Jeanette Weinberg Waterfront Park. Although a sizeable 40,000 gallons, the cistern uses the same principles of basic water collection—a conservation method guests can consider using in homes, schools or around offices.

We continue setting new conservation goals, always aiming to improve and not settling when we've reached a certain target. To date, one of our more ambitious goals has been to achieve net-zero emissions by 2035. We are well on the way to hitting this goal, thanks to things like clean energy sourcing and energy-efficient upgrades. A great example is replacing our 4D theater's lighting and our iconic neon blue wave with more efficient LEDs that produce less heat and last longer. In addition, the solar tree on Pier 4, which we installed in 2022 with support from our partner, Constellation, provides energy to our grid and helps educate visitors about conservation actions and stewardship.

A Harbor Haven

Ground on the piers has been broken numerous times over our history; the latest expansion, though, broke water. In late 2023, construction began on a 10,000-square-foot floating wetland. Less than ten months later, National Aquarium Harbor Wetland presented by CFG Bank is a culmination of almost 15 years of research, prototyping and testing. It marks the return of a tidal salt marsh habitat to the Inner Harbor, offering a glimpse into both the past and future.

Harbor Wetland will help build a tangible connection between visitors and the coastal habitat so crucial to the Chesapeake Bay's health. We hope that as it flourishes, it will leave as impactful a mark on guests as it will on local species and water quality. The exhibit will show what can be achieved through small-scale, persistent action and ingenuity.

Big Waves Start with Small Ripples

The last 43 years have seen many changes, and the future will see more. At our core, we are a conservation organization. Our purpose evolved away from simply displaying species' connections to one another long ago. Today, our mission is to connect people with nature to inspire compassion and care for our ocean planet. Some changes we've made have been practical, others more idealistic. Each one, though, is meant to help build those bonds of connection, encourage individual and collective environmental action, and show that although things might be challenging, we all can make positive differences for our environment.