Citizens Called To Help Keep Lake Erie Clean

CLEVELAND — Northern Ohioans are being empowered to help keep Lake Erie's water clean.

The Cleveland Metroparks and Cleveland Water Alliance are launching a three-year project monitoring Lake Erie water quality. The project, called the Smart Citizen Science Initiative, will give residents low-cost technology to participate in the data collection.

The project will officially launch on July 22 with a webinar outlining how residents can participate in the program. Registration is now open for the webinar.

“We are proud to be a part of this collaboration that will ultimately improve the quality of our region’s most significant natural resource, Lake Erie,” said Metroparks CEO Joseph Roszak. “The ability to tap into our citizen scientists and start to engage the next generation of conservationists is an important step to protecting our watersheds for generations to come.”

Volunteer monitoring programs in Ohio, Michigan and New York will be harnessed as part of the initiative. The first wave of citizen-employed devices will be spectrometers, the Metroparks said.

Spectrometers are easy to use and can be deployed by children and adults, the Metroparks noted. The devices are already used in the Metroparks volunteer monitoring program and in seven Lake Erie communities as part of a 2020 "pilot" initiative. The program should be expanded in 2021.

Lake Erie is harmed by the runoff of excess nutrients and increased storm water, which can lead to the formation of harmful algae blooms. The negative impact of these factors could cost Lake Erie Basin communities $1.3 billion, according to a 2015 report to the International Joint Commission.

A lack of sufficient nutrient data makes it difficult to assess return on investment for individual nutrient mitigation projects.

“This project is a terrific opportunity to get the wider community involved in what we focus on every day: applying technology to water to drive economic development and spark innovation around water,’’ said Cleveland Water Alliance president and executive director Bryan Stubbs.