U. Michigan has received $835,000 from the federal government for a project that promises to improve water quality in the Great Lakes.
Allen Burton, a professor in the School of Natural Resources and Environment, said the money will be used to better detect harmful bacteria and harmful algal blooms, or HABs, in certain areas of the Great Lakes.
“(The purpose of the grant is) to develop and implement techniques, identified by stakeholders, for predicting water quality at beaches up to two days in advance and for forecasting the trajectory and fate of harmful algal blooms wherever they occur in the Great Lakes,” the grant proposal said.
Burton, director of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Cooperative Institute for Limnology and Ecosystems Research, is one of seven principal investigators working on the project. The other six scientists include three from the NOAA and three from the University.
The current system in place to monitor bacterial levels in the Great Lakes is known as the “persistence model,” which uses one day’s measurements of E. coli levels to determine the next day’s water quality.
The principle investigators on the project claim that this model can predict inaccurate health conditions more than 50 percent of the time. The new model they plan to put in place with the grant money, they say, will improve predictions of swimming conditions by at least 20 to 30 percent.
In addition to better predicting bacterial levels in the water, the project will develop a better method to monitor, forecast and understand HABs.
According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention Health Studies Program, HABs occur when algae grow quickly, forming visible patches in the water. The patches can block sunlight and deplete the oxygen that other organisms need to survive. The HABs also may release toxins that are dangerous to humans and other animals.
The current method for detecting HABs, the principle investigators argue, is “not sufficient to provide timely warning about the presence of HAB … at a drinking water intake or recreational beach.”
Burton said scientists will be able to accomplish a lot with the grant money because it will supplement research that has already begun.
“The fact that this is taking ongoing projects to the next level … will make it easy to accomplish a lot in the next year,” Burton said.
Scientists from Michigan State University, University of South Florida and the Michigan Sea Grant will also collaborate on the project.
The money awarded to the University is part of a larger $5.5 million federal grant for protecting the Great Lakes. The largest sum of $3 million is going toward plant and animal habitats in Saugatuck, while the Houghton area will get $1.7 million for ecology and conservation research, according to the Associated Press.