Penn State Extension’s “Dive Deeper – Youth Water Educators Summit” recently received a Governor's Award for Environmental Excellence, presented annually by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.
Greater Allegheny Professor Alandra Kahl is working with an Australian-based university on research about water quality.
Nutrient pollution is a major issue affecting water quality around the world: the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency names it “one of America's most widespread, costly and challenging environmental problems.” The Chesapeake Bay, with some 64,000 square miles of land draining into a shallow, narrow body of water just 200 miles long, is in some respects a worst-case scenario. Over the last 10 years, Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences has taken a lead role in solving this problem.
Penn State issued its annual drinking water quality report on April 23. Penn State routinely monitors the University’s drinking water, and the full report can be viewed on the Office of Physical Plant website.
Furthering agriculture teachers' knowledge about the value of hands-on watershed education was the focus of recent workshops hosted by the Chesapeake Bay Foundation in partnership with Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences' Center for Professional Development.
As Penn State researchers stood on the banks of Scalp Level Run, an acid mine drainage-polluted stream in Cambria County, a scientific question formed: How is nature removing toxic metals from the drainage at a rate faster than any other tested waters in the state, under pH conditions deemed too low to do so?
If you have an interest in learning about or influencing laws, regulations, policies and government programs related to agriculture, food and natural resources, Penn State's Ag Progress Days, Aug. 15-17, will present opportunities to do just that. A variety of events and exhibits will feature state and federal agencies, state legislators, state cabinet secretaries, a congressman and the governor of Pennsylvania.
No matter where Pennsylvanians live, virtually all citizens have a role to play in protecting the state's critical water resources. Visitors to the College of Agricultural Sciences Exhibits Building and Theater at Penn State's Ag Progress Days, Aug. 15-17, can learn how they can contribute to keeping water clean, safe and abundant.
A group of institutions led by Penn State has received nearly $2.2 million for the first year of a planned four-year, $5 million project aimed at developing a model for engaging communities and stakeholders to ensure adequate supplies of good-quality water both for and from agriculture. Partners include the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Research Service, Arizona State University and the University of Nebraska Lincoln.
Where does road salt go after the ice melts? Penn State Behrend biologist Pam Silver finds it in streams and wetlands — even in the middle of summer.
Many Pennsylvania farmers in the Chesapeake Bay watershed have voluntarily implemented, at their own expense, practices aimed at improving water quality, according to newly released survey research conducted by Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences.
Consumers who want to calculate and reduce their use of products containing chemicals that can contaminate water supplies now have a tool to assist them, thanks to a Penn State researcher and her students.
Researchers, educators, elected officials, farmers, agribusiness professionals and agricultural and environmental agency representatives gathered for the 2016 Penn State Agricultural Research Tour in late September to learn about current water quality and soil health research relevant to the Chesapeake Bay watershed.
Collaborative strategies to meet water-quality goals for Pennsylvania's rivers and streams while ensuring productive agriculture will be the topic of a panel discussion at this year's Ag Progress Days exposition. The Aug. 17 event will be hosted by Rick Roush, dean of Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences, and Russell Redding, state agriculture secretary.
Penn State Extension educators will be visiting hundreds of farms in the next month to follow up on a survey Pennsylvania farmers received earlier this year asking about conservation practices they have adopted to promote water quality and soil health.
