Floating Treatment Wetlands

Jacob Stover Author

08/03/2020 Added

23 Plays

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Harmful algal blooms are causing great damage to our lakes here in the midwest. Floating treatment wetlands are designed to combat these forming algal blooms. Research was done into which lakes could use these most and where they should be placed.

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[00:00:01.234]Hello, my name is Jacob Stover.
[00:00:03.194]I am a UCARE Undergraduate Research
[00:00:05.554]student this summer.
[00:00:06.934]I am majoring in agricultural engineering
[00:00:09.244]with emphasis in soil and water resoures.
[00:00:12.092]This summer, I did research on
[00:00:13.522]Floating treatment Wetlands (FTWs)
[00:00:15.162]placement in Nebraska lakes, like where
[00:00:17.032]it should be placed and which
[00:00:18.982]lakes it should be placed in.
[00:00:20.442]And we did this research with the graduate
[00:00:22.542]students Levi McKercher, Matthew Russell,
[00:00:24.882]and Dr. Messer as our faculty member.
[00:00:28.370]So, some background here.
[00:00:30.210]Non-point Source Pollution
[00:00:31.900]So, Non-point Source Pollution (NSP) is
[00:00:33.807]the main cause of water contamination
[00:00:35.673]around the world.
[00:00:37.610]It basically is where water is flowing
[00:00:39.469]across any distance,
[00:00:40.721]and whether it's above ground or below
[00:00:42.541]ground.
[00:00:43.318]It picks up contaminants,
[00:00:44.788]like the contaminants are piled up over a
[00:00:46.738]distance.
[00:00:47.558]And these flow into the water ways
[00:00:49.183]and the water ways flow into water bodies.
[00:00:52.100]So this causes an increase in the
[00:00:53.861]nutrients that exist in these
[00:00:56.610]water ways or water bodies
[00:00:58.542]and this results in eutrophication.
[00:01:00.436]Eutrophication is where
[00:01:03.760]the nutrients that build up in the
[00:01:05.446]water cause harmful algal blooms to pop up
[00:01:08.226]or just large scale algal blooms to pop up
[00:01:11.405]and these harmful algal blooms can result
[00:01:14.525]in economic loses of approximately
[00:01:16.479]2.2 billion dollars annually.
[00:01:18.269]This is a huge, huge hit to our economy.
[00:01:21.327]This affects tourism, recreation,
[00:01:24.707]property values, drinking water treatment,
[00:01:26.757]commercial fishing, management practices,
[00:01:29.607]and just loss of biodiversity in general.
[00:01:31.772]It can also be deadly to people as well.
[00:01:34.221]As you can see in this harmful algal bloom
[00:01:36.347]on this lake,
[00:01:37.578]they actually deprive the water of
[00:01:39.579]dissolved oxygen, and then this in turn
[00:01:42.473]does not allow the fish, or life
[00:01:44.671]underwater to breath because they rely on
[00:01:47.561]the dissolved oxygen,
[00:01:48.791]and this causes massive fish kills and
[00:01:51.151]just depletes life from the lake
[00:01:53.934]as well, they take over the entire lake.
[00:01:56.630]That's why it's necessary to have
[00:01:58.700]important management practices and FTWs.
[00:02:01.917]So, the technical term for FTWs is
[00:02:04.470]emergent macrophyte wetland plant species
[00:02:06.487]growing from floating mats, with roots
[00:02:08.327]suspended in the water column
[00:02:09.808]and plant biomass growing above.
[00:02:11.514]We have a schematic of it over here.
[00:02:13.905]The roots, they provide substrate or large
[00:02:16.352]surface area for growing of biofilm
[00:02:18.303]containing beneficial microorganisms,
[00:02:20.270]generally non-photosynthetic bacterial
[00:02:22.340]communities.
[00:02:23.588]These bacterial communities take the
[00:02:26.318]nutrients and break them down further
[00:02:28.526]so that the harmful algal blooms
[00:02:30.636]do not have a chance to form off of and
[00:02:32.566]also break down other contaminants that
[00:02:34.236]are present from NSP.
[00:02:37.205]So in our research, every undergraduate
[00:02:39.345]was assigned different lakes.
[00:02:40.903]I was assigned Glenn Cunningham lake near
[00:02:42.993]Omaha,
[00:02:43.830]Pawnee Lake near Lincoln, Maskenthine
[00:02:46.400]Reservoir near Norfolk, and the Lone Star
[00:02:47.810]Reservoir near Tobias.
[00:02:50.930]So the Purpose & hypothesis.
[00:02:52.602]So our first purpose is to determine where
[00:02:54.850]FTWs should be placed in water bodies
[00:02:56.632]based on lake size, water quality
[00:02:58.602]impairments, and season.
[00:03:00.465]Our second purpose is to determine
[00:03:02.235]which lakes would benefit more from FTWs.
[00:03:05.458]For our Materials & Methods, we analyzed
[00:03:07.798]lake quality. We were given a bunch of
[00:03:10.258]data from the Nebraska department of
[00:03:12.588]Environment and Energy. We analyzed all
[00:03:15.680]of this data and sorted it as well.
[00:03:17.256]For most water quality parameters, data
[00:03:19.186]was available from the 5th May 2009 to the
[00:03:21.256]9 of September 2018. And the parameters
[00:03:23.806]analyzed were parameters that affected
[00:03:25.766]eutrophication. This is very important in
[00:03:28.300]our study. We also analyzed weather data
[00:03:30.763]as well.
[00:03:31.726]For our weather data, it was collected by
[00:03:33.162]the Automated Weather Data Network.
[00:03:35.248]Weather stations were chosen based on
[00:03:37.750]distance from the lakes that were studied.
[00:03:38.689]We just chose whichever weather station
[00:03:40.429]was available which was closest to our
[00:03:42.121]lakes that we were analyzing.
[00:03:45.440]Not just in general but each individual
[00:03:46.784]lake we chose a weather station for.
[00:03:49.234]This data was accessed via the
[00:03:50.744]High Plains Regional Climate Center and
[00:03:52.534]filtered based on the time frame that
[00:03:54.295]water quality parameter data was
[00:03:55.938]available.
[00:03:56.873]The weather data that the site focuses on
[00:03:58.840]includes: daily temperature in degrees
[00:04:00.670]Fahrenheit, the highs and lows, the
[00:04:02.435]precipitation in inches, and solar
[00:04:04.450]radiation in Langley.
[00:04:05.250]This is important because harmful algal
[00:04:07.398]blooms are more present in warmer areas
[00:04:11.348]because warmer temperatures have higher
[00:04:15.058]growth rates and precipitation is
[00:04:17.338]important to analyze because the higher
[00:04:19.178]precipitation there is, the more runoff
[00:04:21.178]there will be into the lakes as well
[00:04:22.908]especially if it is a huge burst of
[00:04:24.602]precipitation. Solar radiation is
[00:04:27.162]important to analyze as well because solar
[00:04:28.812]radiation contributes to algal bloom
[00:04:31.632]growth as well.
[00:04:34.357]So for our results, the wetlands,
[00:04:35.962]we decided that they should be placed in
[00:04:37.422]areas that would enhance plant uptake of
[00:04:39.352]nutrients, areas and lakes with high
[00:04:41.206]nitrogen and phosphorus species,
[00:04:43.274]and places that would enhance
[00:04:45.384]denitrification as well.
[00:04:47.169]So, low dissolved oxygen, relatively
[00:04:49.089]neutral (5-8) pH, and warm temperatures.
[00:04:52.391]Our FTWs, they work best during good
[00:04:55.671]growing season if they have a good season
[00:04:57.731]of course because they are plants as well.
[00:05:00.673]Here is some of the data that I grabbed
[00:05:03.224]from the 25 different data parameters that
[00:05:07.014]apply to the plant uptake of nutrients and
[00:05:09.024]denitrification.
[00:05:10.180]We have the nitrogen content here for our
[00:05:12.750]different lakes.
[00:05:13.870]We have the phosphorus parameters as well
[00:05:17.180]for our lakes.
[00:05:18.429]For the denitrification, we have the
[00:05:20.229]dissolved oxygen, the pH, and the high
[00:05:22.069]temperature. These are averages over the
[00:05:24.559]time frame that we were given of the data.
[00:05:27.318]So for our conclusion,
[00:05:28.949]we decided that temperature can be
[00:05:30.599]neglected on affecting FTW performance
[00:05:33.279]due to the average high temps being close.
[00:05:36.149]Now if we were analyzing different regions
[00:05:38.209]or different states across the U.S.
[00:05:40.039]it would be important to analyze the
[00:05:41.819]temperature, but since we are confined to
[00:05:44.329]Nebraska for this research, the
[00:05:45.909]temperature can be neglected.
[00:05:49.462]So we noticed that the Lone Star Reservoir
[00:05:51.522]has very high phosphorus and nitrogen
[00:05:54.436]concentrations in mg/L in this lake,
[00:05:59.150]as you can see here, it's higher than
[00:06:01.460]Pawnee lake and Maskenthine,
[00:06:02.986]not Cunningham, inorganic nitrogen, I'll
[00:06:05.226]talk about that later.
[00:06:06.800]It just has much higher nitrogen and
[00:06:08.870]phosphorus contents than the other lakes
[00:06:11.690]as well.
[00:06:12.585]It also has the lowest dissolved oxygen
[00:06:14.905]as well.
[00:06:15.685]Which that's important to remember as well
[00:06:17.725]because the lower dissolved oxygen that
[00:06:19.605]there is, that means that there could be a
[00:06:22.325]higher presence of harmful algal blooms.
[00:06:24.988]So, due to these factors, we decided that
[00:06:26.948]the Lone Star Reservoir is the lake in the
[00:06:28.958]greatest need of FTWs.
[00:06:31.128]But, we also decided that Cunningham lake
[00:06:33.518]could be in very big need of FTWs as well.
[00:06:36.764]Because if you look at the inorganic
[00:06:38.524]nitrogen,
[00:06:39.244]sure Lone Star Reservoir is higher than
[00:06:41.112]Maskenthine and Pawnee,
[00:06:42.352]but Cunningham has an insane amount of
[00:06:44.402]inorganic nitrogen, it's on a league of
[00:06:46.442]its own.
[00:06:47.373]This could be present because Glenn
[00:06:49.043]Cunningham lake is right next to Omaha
[00:06:50.883]so there could be city runoff going into
[00:06:52.873]Glenn Cunningham Lake
[00:06:54.153]which is important to remember
[00:06:56.163]also agricultural runoff as well,
[00:06:57.753]but that's present in all these lakes.
[00:06:59.903]Glenn Cunningham suffers from very high
[00:07:02.653]amounts of inorganic nitrogen.
[00:07:04.363]It could use FTWs as well.
[00:07:08.178]We will be conducting further research as
[00:07:10.158]where to put these FTWs in Lone Star
[00:07:12.488]Reservoir and Glenn Cunningham Lake.
[00:07:17.991]What we are doing actually is, we got
[00:07:20.250]ArcGIS templates from the USDA website
[00:07:23.809]and we are analyzing,
[00:07:25.639]we delineated the watersheds for these
[00:07:27.859]lakes and we are analyzing all the
[00:07:30.499]watersheds, like where the water pours in,
[00:07:32.659]and if it would possibly be better for the
[00:07:35.899]FTWs to be placed in the middle of the
[00:07:38.749]lake, in coves, or inlets.
[00:07:41.059]We are trying to decide where the best
[00:07:42.879]places would be.
[00:07:43.649]We think it's probably going to be
[00:07:45.279]specific to each lake so we are still
[00:07:47.089]trying to determine that.
[00:07:48.772]Here's my bibliography.
[00:07:50.232]Special acknowledgements go to the
[00:07:52.122]Nebraska Department of Environment and
[00:07:53.932]Energy
[00:07:54.642]and also to the USDA for giving us the
[00:07:56.462]ArcMap templates.
[00:07:57.712]Thank you very much for your time
[00:07:59.528]and have a great day!

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Floating Treatment Wetlands

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