你可能還記得,過去的這個夏天,一百萬人生活在托萊多,俄亥俄州,區(qū)域被告知不要喝他們的水龍頭的水出來了好幾天。宣布進入緊急狀態(tài),因為有害藻華,毒素釋放到水可以使許多人生病。
海藻像附近托萊多在一定程度上是由于過量的營養(yǎng)物質在水里——具體來說,氮和磷。這些營養(yǎng)物質對生態(tài)系統(tǒng)是必不可少的,但是太多的人在一個地方是壞消息。有害藻華不僅給人們的健康帶來巨大的風險,他們也會引起魚類和其他水生野生動物死亡。
清理后發(fā)生的赤潮喝水可以成本高達數(shù)十億美元,和當?shù)亟洕鷷苡绊�。美國旅游業(yè)就失去了每年近10億美元當人們選擇不魚,去劃船或者訪問受到影響的區(qū)域。這是我們國家的一個最大的和最昂貴的環(huán)境問題。也是一個特別艱難,因為營養(yǎng)物質可以從遠上游徑流,并收集在安靜的水域,如湖泊或海岸線。
這就是為什么一群聯(lián)邦機構和私人合作伙伴——包括我們的辦公室的研發(fā)和我們辦公室的水——宣布營養(yǎng)傳感器的挑戰(zhàn)。挑戰(zhàn)將有助于加速傳感器的發(fā)展,可以部署在環(huán)境來衡量我國營養(yǎng)的水道。它的目標是有新的廉價傳感器啟動并運行到2017年。
在EPA我們運行一個營養(yǎng)管理創(chuàng)新研究項目,在網站,從墨西哥灣的切薩皮克灣的大湖。我們也正在與新技術,可以讓我們更好的營養(yǎng)信息污染,包括衛(wèi)星和便攜式遠程傳感器。
有一些巨大的挑戰(zhàn)我們需要考慮采取下一步營養(yǎng)污染。我們需要擴大監(jiān)測工作,得到更多的信息關于營養(yǎng)來自哪里,他們建立。但是我們目前的技術太貴這樣的規(guī)模。我們還需要確保任何新的監(jiān)控工作準確、可靠,所以我們獲取數(shù)據我們可以信任。
營養(yǎng)傳感器的挑戰(zhàn)將這些需求的技術開發(fā)人員。它將支持努力創(chuàng)建的負擔得起的,我們需要準確和可靠的傳感器。它還將提供參與實驗室和現(xiàn)場驗證的組織和幫助他們展示他們的創(chuàng)新。
這些類型的伙伴關系保持我國的科學前沿,并幫助我們承擔大、復雜的問題,即使在現(xiàn)在,當預算保持相同的情況下,甚至萎縮。當我們得到最好的思想在每個部門一起工作,我們可以更好的保護環(huán)境和人類健康。
New Challenge: Put Technology To Work To Protect Drinking Water
You likely remember when, this past summer, half a million people who live in the Toledo, Ohio, area were told not to drink the water coming out of their taps for several days. A state of emergency was declared because of a harmful algal bloom, which released toxins into the water that could have made many people ill.
Algal blooms like the one near Toledo are partly caused by an excessive amount of nutrients in the water – specifically, nitrogen and phosphorus. These nutrients are essential for ecosystems, but too many of them in one place is bad news. Not only do harmful algal blooms pose huge risks for people’s health, they can also cause fish and other aquatic wildlife to die off.
Cleaning up drinking water after a harmful algal bloom can cost billions of dollars, and local economies can suffer. The U.S. tourism industry alone loses close to $1 billion each year when people choose not to fish, go boating or visit areas that have been affected. It’s one of our country’s biggest and most expensive environmental problems. It’s also a particularly tough one, since nutrients can travel from far upstream and in runoff, and collect in quieter waters like lakes or along coastlines.
That’s why a group of federal agencies and private partners – including our Office of Research and Development and our Office of Water – are announcing the Nutrient Sensor Challenge. The challenge will help accelerate the development of sensors that can be deployed in the environment to measure nutrients in our country’s waterways. Its goal is to have new, affordable sensors up and running by 2017.
At EPA we run an innovative research program on nutrients management, at sites that range from the Gulf of Mexico to the Great Lakes to Chesapeake Bay. We’ve also been working with new technologies that can give us better information on nutrient pollution, including satellites and portable remote sensors.
There are a few big challenges we’ll need to reckon with to take the next step on nutrient pollution. We need to expand monitoring efforts and get even more information about where nutrients are coming from and where they’re building up. But our current technologies are too expensive to take to that kind of scale. We also need to ensure that any new monitoring effort is accurate and reliable, so we’re getting data we can trust.
The Nutrient Sensor Challenge puts these needs out to the world of technology developers. It will support efforts to create the kind of affordable, accurate and reliable sensors we need. It will also provide the organizations that participate with laboratory and field verification and help them showcase their innovation.
These kinds of partnerships keep our country’s science on the cutting edge, and help us take on big, complex problems, even at times like now when budgets are staying the same, or even shrinking. When we get the best minds in every sector working together, we can better protect the environment and human health.
