Water Resources Research Act Program

Details for Project ID 2016NY229B

Student Researcher Support of Adaptive Management of the St Lawrence River using Novel Water Quality Monitoring Methodology

Institute: New York
Year Established: 2016 Start Date: 2016-03-01 End Date: 2017-02-28
Total Federal Funds: $10,000 Total Non-Federal Funds: $2,128

Principal Investigators: Michael Twiss, Joseph Skufca

Project Summary: Restrictive water level regulation in the Saint Lawrence River over the past 50 years has had a profound impact on ecosystem health in both the river. Currently, there are no explicit plans to determine how the restoration of more natural water level regimes in the St. Lawrence will impact water quality, although great effort has been made to develop adaptive management as the proper strategic approach. Water quality sensor arrays will be continuously operated in the Moses-Saunders hydropower dam to provide data that can relate change in water quality to changes in water levels. Mercury will be measure d in water flowing through sensor arrays as well as in wetlands upstream that have the potential to release Hg with changing water level scenarios. The objective is to collect water quality data and relate this to water levels, to assess the potential for changing water levels to release Hg into the river and to produce three audience-appropriate videos to describe this important endeavor.