This project will address an emerging issue along the coast of Lake Michigan in Northwest Indiana: microbiological pollution of beach sands due to failing septic systems. We will sample beaches in areas of known septic system failures and the sand for E. coli, human fecal bacterial DNA markers, and common pathogens. Successful execution of this project will result in data that can be used for a quantitative microbial risk assessment (QMRA) for beachgoers in the area and an experimental framework that can be expanded to examine beach sands in other Indiana coastal communities with high densities of shoreline septic systems.

This project was funded through the “Social and Economic Impacts of PFAS in the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain Regions” opportunity. Key objectives are:

• To characterize fish consumption behavior among recreational fishers in two predominantly African American populations in the Lake Michigan area by holding a listening session and conducting surveys at fishing sites.
• To explore these two communities’ familiarity with contaminants in fish including PFAS, their understanding of fish advisories and the potential health risks of eating recreationally-caught fish, preferred sources of health information, and behavior change domains.

Michigan Sea Grant will support outreach efforts for this project. 

• Explore application of a new enabling technology to aquatic food web dynamics
• Assess whether organisms within trophic levels have unique chemical/nutrient compositions

This project was funded through the “Social and Economic Impacts of PFAS in the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain Regions” opportunity. 

The main objective of our proposal is how to communicate risk to focus on factors that could increase compliance with PFAS recommendations (e.g., using water filtration systems) and avoid unintended consequences, such as dismissing a complex message due to lack of understanding or generating fear and threat perception without a means to alleviate the threat. We have three studies where we focus specifically on: 1.) What types of information people look for online about PFAS; 2.) what type of messaging is most effective for communicating about the health risk of PFAS in an experiment with a focus on the variables of efficacy to enact recommendations, level of fear and threat conveyed by the message, and complexity of the message, and, 3.) What PFAS-related messages are most engaging in a real-world paid message test conducted on social media to residents who rely on municipal water supplies, including tests targeting both English and Spanish-speakers.

Wisconsin Sea Grant will support outreach efforts for this project.

This project was funded through the “Social and Economic Impacts of PFAS in the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain Regions” opportunity. 

The objectives of this study are: i) to advance the understanding of community risks of PFAS pollution exposure in MI, NY, and PA; and ii) to examine the effectiveness of the local regulations in the three states on motivating public awareness and avoidance behaviors.

New York Sea Grant is supporting outreach efforts for this proposal.

One of the significant issues with urbanization and a rapidly changing climate is an increase in storm-runoff and the speed of stormwater reaching the existing drainage system. The drainage system is overburdened by the amount of flows during rainfall causing flash floods. Also, the untreated runoff is released to local water-bodies. The pollutants in urban runoff can cause eutrophication that severely affects the aquatic life and creates an imbalance in the eco-system. The rationale for this research is to confront this global issue through a local solution.

The motivations for this study are 1) To develop a sustainable urban drainage system through purifying parking lots and roofs. 2) To develop a design procedure as well as materials for constructing purifying parking lots or roofs. 3) To collaborate with construction firms and stakeholders in transforming the research into practice. 4) To promote the economic, social, and environment rewards due to the sustainable drainage system to all beneficiary’s like local community, retail and commercial firms in the southern Lake Michigan area.