The Ecohydrology Research Group met with the City of Kitchener’s Sanitary and Stormwater Utilities Department to provide updates on two NSERC Alliance funded projects in which the City is a partner. The projects investigate (1) the sources and fate of microplastics in stormwater infrastructure and (2) greenhouse gas budgets of green/blue stormwater systems. The meeting was held on Monday October 30, 2023, in the City of Kitchener Operations Facility. Philippe Van Cappellen (PI) presented an overview of the urban stormwater microplastics and greenhouse gas projects and ERG’s graduate students Hang Nguyen, Amir Reshadi, and Erin Griffiths gave presentations on their microplastics project results, conducted on 5 stormwater ponds in the City of Kitchener. After these presentations, the City and ERG teams continued the discussions in a round table to agree with the strategic planning for the next year of field work in Kitchener.
Learn more about the NSERC Alliance Microplastics and Missions project:
- "Microplastics pollution: Water Institute researchers address key research gaps," Water Institute news, May 31, 2021
- "Adaptive management of green stormwater infrastructure project receives green light", Water Institute news, May 8, 2023