Research

Mortenson Center innovations delivering clean water to more than 16 million worldwide

Jeff Zehnder — Tue, 17 Jun 2025 21:08:54 +0000

Mortenson Center innovations delivering clean water to more than 16 million worldwide Jeff Zehnder Tue, 06/17/2025 - 15:08

Approximately two billion people worldwide rely on drinking water sources contaminated with fecal matter, according to the World Health Organization. That figure has remained stubbornly high, even after decades of international investment and development efforts, as many water systems continue to fail—breaking down, delivering unsafe water or becoming financially unsustainable for the communities they were intended to serve.

The Mortenson Center in Global Engineering & Resilience at the �鶹��Ƶ is building a new model for global water access, one that is grounded in a deep understanding of why so many past efforts have fallen short. Rather than focusing on infrastructure alone, the Center treats clean water as a long-term service that requires sustainable financing, ongoing monitoring and built-in accountability.

Led by Professor Evan Thomas, director of the Mortenson Center and a former NASA engineer, the Center’s approach blends engineering, data science and climate finance to design safe water systems that not only function but also endure. By focusing on long-term service delivery rather than one-time infrastructure projects, the Mortenson Center is redefining how clean water is brought to communities in low-resource settings.

So far, this approach has reached an estimated 16 million people. More than six million have gained access to clean water through programs the Mortenson Center has directly implemented. An additional ten million have been served through governments, nonprofits and private companies that have adopted its methods—applying its technologies, monitoring tools and financing models in programs around the world.

For decades, low-income communities have been expected to operate and maintain drinking water systems on their own, even as wealthier countries heavily subsidize water for their populations. Unsurprisingly, many systems collapse. Pumps break, water becomes unsafe and local governments or nonprofits lack the funding and tools to respond.

The Mortenson Center's approach is belief in locally driven innovation.

The Mortenson Center addresses these gaps by integrating performance-based financing with rigorous, real-time data systems. One breakthrough came in 2007, when Professor Thomas launched the first United Nations–accredited programs to generate carbon credits for water treatment. These programs reduce the need to boil water over firewood or fossil fuels—cutting emissions and generating revenue to keep systems operational.

Working with partners including the Millennium Water Alliance, Swiss nonprofit Helvetas, the Eastern Congo Initiative, Virridy and LifeStraw, the Mortenson Center is currently supporting clean drinking water services for more than one million people across Kenya, Rwanda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Madagascar. These programs are on track to reach three million people by 2030 and generate over one million carbon credits—a key funding mechanism that supports long-term system maintenance. Buyers of these credits include companies such as Mortenson Construction in Minneapolis.

To ensure clean water actually reaches the people it’s meant to serve, the Mortenson Center has also developed and commercialized a suite of satellite-connected monitoring technologies. These include a water quality sensor that uses tryptophan-like fluorescence and machine learning to detect E. coli contamination in real time, turning water safety into a verifiable, measurable outcome. These tools have been deployed in over ten countries by NGOs, governments and private companies.

At the core of the Mortenson Center’s approach is a belief in locally driven innovation. Graduate students from Rwanda, Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda and Ghana are leading research on the technical, financial and policy dimensions of clean water programs, ensuring that future solutions are not only globally informed but locally grounded.

As climate change intensifies pressure on global water systems, the Mortenson Center’s model offers a rare combination of technical innovation, financial sustainability and measurable impact—charting a scalable, sustainable path to clean water for millions still in need.

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First-of-its-kind study provides a detailed look at water quality along the Colorado River’s upper basin

Jeff Zehnder — Sat, 14 Dec 2024 15:47:15 +0000

First-of-its-kind study provides a detailed look at water quality along the Colorado River’s upper basin Jeff Zehnder Sat, 12/14/2024 - 08:47

Michael Gooseff and collaborators are gathering the first-ever continuous, long-term water quality sample of the Colorado River's upper basin. INSTAAR senior communication specialist Gabe Allen joined them for three days on the river.

One vessel in particular stood out from the rafts of vacationers and fisherman that floated lazily through Ruby Canyon on a sunny fall day last month. The occupants had swapped the usual fish and tackle for binders, laptops and an assortment of pumps and devices all buckled together with ratchet straps.

Aboard the raft, U.S. Geological Survey groundwater hydrologist Connor Newman bottled river water samples and jotted down notes in a waterproof notebook. Behind him, INSTAAR faculty fellow Michael Gooseff manned the oars and kept a watchful eye on a collection of sensors strung on a pole that extended into the water from the back of the boat.

This is the tenth time Gooseff and his collaborators have rafted this stretch of river since 2018. The goal is to gather the first-ever continuous, long-term water quality sample of the Colorado River's upper basin. In 2023, the USGS awarded Gooseff’s team with funding for biannual surveys through 2026.

Newman pumps river water into sample containers while Gooseff mans the oars.

A new approach

While water quality data is usually limited to discrete monitoring stations posted every few miles along the river bank, Gooseff’s boat-mounted sensors capture data every 40-60 feet. He calls this sampling method “Lagrangian sampling” after the 18th-century mathematician Joseph-Louis Legrange.

“His idea was that you could take the perspective of a moving particle in the world and try to understand how it changed based on its surroundings — as opposed to sitting somewhere and watching the world change around you.” Gooseff explained.

Gooseff’s raft, or “floating sampling platform” as he likes to call it, is equipped to measure pH, temperature, conductivity, turbidity, dissolved oxygen and nitrate. Collectively, these measurements offer a detailed map of the character and contents of Colorado River water as it travels from Rocky Mountain National Park to the canyonlands.

“What we’re trying to do is to figure out, ‘where do we see systematic changes along the river,’” Gooseff explained. “And now we have a higher spatial resolution.”

A map of the Colorado River and a waterproof notebook for logging data lay on a cooler atop the "floating sampling platform." The team collected physical samples of river water every three miles for later analysis.

Pinpointing water quality

The project has already reaped insights. In 2019, Gooseff and his colleagues published a paper detailing early findings. The researchers were able to pinpoint sources of salts, nitrogen, turbidity and temperature fluctuation over time and space.

One particular finding offered important insight to river users. Somewhere around Grand Junction, Colorado, nitrate concentrations in the Colorado River increase. A signal like this is usually the result of agricultural runoff, but water managers weren’t sure exactly where the nitrate was coming from. Was it from the confluence with the Gunnison River, which hosts large farms upstream? Was it from local farms in the Grand Valley?

Gooseff’s data showed that nitrate levels spiked when the Gunnison entered the Colorado and then continued to climb as the river moved through the Grand Valley. The study elucidated, for the first time, how much nitrate was contributed by each source.

Gooseff hopes that findings like these can help water and land managers better solve issues as they arise. The upper basin is especially important because changes in water quality here can compound as the water travels to lower-basin states like California. Nitrate, which can lead to harmful algal blooms in high enough concentrations, is just one example.

“There’s a lot of the Colorado River watershed that has the opportunity to modify water quality before it gets to the end of the basin,” he said.

Newman sits next to the Gasometrix miniREUDI and speculates on potential uses for the device. On this trip, he used the miniREUDI to sense fluctuations in helium. He hopes the data will give the scientists a more precise idea of where groundwater enters the Colorado River.

Understanding groundwater

This year, the floating sampling platform featured a new gadget. Newman brought along a portable mass spectrometer called a miniREUDI that is capable of detecting precise concentrations of noble gases, like helium or argon, in the water.

The miniREUDI was more expensive than everything else in the boat combined, and is one of only two in the U.S., but it was worth it. By tracking helium along the Colorado, Newman can infer where salty groundwater is entering the river.

“The noble gases are an indicator of where there’s old groundwater discharge,” Newman explained. “We essentially look for the helium to show us where there might be influence of salts because the salinity of the Colorado River is one of the primary management concerns for downstream users.”

If the Colorado becomes too salty, it could prevent lower-basin users in California and Mexico from using the water for agriculture, industry or drinking water. Newman’s data will give water managers more information that they can use to map and prevent excess salinity.

Newman, Gooseff and other collaborators outlined their methodology and rationale for using miniREUDI in the boat in a paper in the Journal of Hydrology this summer. They hope to publish more results soon.

Click to zoom

Packing up

As Gooseff’s raft passed through the Black Rocks, a popular swimming, fishing and cliff-jumping spot in Horsethief Canyon, a fisherman waved from a nearby boat.

“You all are with the USGS?” he asked. “I use your data all the time.”

Because Gooseff’s research is funded by the USGS, any papers or datasets that come from it will be freely available to the public. The insights will be invaluable for land and river managers like the Bureau of Land Management. With any luck, they could help especially science-literate fishermen find a new honey hole as well.

By now, the floating sampling platform, oars and camping gear are packed away for the winter. But, it won’t be long before Gooseff heads back up to the Pumphouse Boat Launch to run the river during the high-flow spring season. As much as he relishes long days in the field and nights spent under the moonlight, the quiet months are just as interesting.

“The real reward is stepping back after our samples are analyzed and our data comes together and asking ‘what have we learned,’” he said.

Newman and Gooseff drift into camp at the end of a long day of data collection.

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Using nanoscale membranes to clean water on the Moon

Jeff Zehnder — Fri, 25 Oct 2024 22:26:02 +0000

Using nanoscale membranes to clean water on the Moon Jeff Zehnder Fri, 10/25/2024 - 16:26

Jeff Zehnder

Anthony Straub is making major advances in water purification technology for industry and human consumption on Earth and in space, with his work on a nanotechnology membrane process taking a major step toward commercialization, thanks to a new NASA grant.

An assistant professor in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering at the �鶹��Ƶ, Straub’s research focuses on using membranes to improve water treatment.

“The membrane technology that is widely used now is essentially half a century old, and it has well-known limitations,” Straub said. “ It works well for many applications, but it has a tendency to let certain impurities through and it degrades if exposed to certain harsh chemicals.”

NASA has awarded Straub and one of his PhD students, Kian Lopez, a phase one Small Business Innovation Research award to develop a pilot water purification system for astronauts to use on a future Moon base.

Current space water purification systems are bulky and prone to repairs. The technology Straub’s lab has developed only requires a pump to pressurize water, reducing size and weight. Low weight is especially important in moon missions, where every kilogram of cargo can cost tens of thousands of dollars.

“Current membranes remove impurities based on size and charge and, as a result, allow for small impurities to bypass the membrane,” Straub said. “What we’ve designed traps a very small layer of air inside a membrane and the only way for the water to cross the barrier is by evaporating and then re-condensing on the other side, which impurities inherently cannot do.”

The entire process occurs over a 100 nanometer span, a distance 160 times smaller than the width of a human hair, and the water that results is nearly pure H2O – distillation quality — since it has been turned to steam and then back to liquid.

These new membranes can be made from a wide variety of materials; the advance is in modifying them to create the air trapping layer. Although the work has been a longtime focus of Straub, he had not considered space applications or commercialization until Lopez returned from an internship at NASA.

Schematic of the membrane process.

“My mentor at NASA said this technology looks promising and the biggest impact we could have would be to start our own company,” Lopez said.

Straub and Lopez decided to attend the New Venture Launch class together in the CU Boulder Leeds Business School, participating in campus technology transfer initiatives, including the New Venture Challenge and Lab Venture Challenge. They founded Osmopure Technologies, Inc. in January of this year.

Space is but one application. Other potential is in municipal water systems and industry, particularly semiconductor or computer chip manufacturing, which requires ultrapure water.

Although ultrapure sounds like a marketing buzzword, it has a formal definition: water free of all minerals, particles, bacteria, microbes, and dissolved gasses. The needs go far beyond water that is safe for human consumption.

“The minimum for ultrapure water in chip manufacturing is a 14-step process right now. The final product must contain less than one 10-nanometer particle per milliliter of water, which would be the density equivalent of having only a single person on the entire planet Earth,” Lopez said.

Semiconductor chips are manufactured in clean rooms, and ultrapure water is necessary to maintain temperature and humidity as well as to wash away residue produced during chip etching. Even the tiniest water impurities can damage the chips.

“Our work starts with NASA, but the beachhead market here on Earth is in ultrapure water production for semiconductors,” Straub said. “This is a huge potential market, and we have filed a provisional patents with Venture Partners at CU Boulder.”

Straub is optimistic the grant will enable them to make significant progress in the coming months.

“This has been a four-year process, and at the beginning we didn’t know if it would work,” Straub said. “We started with theory and then went into the lab to test. The fabrication has gone through several iterations here in the CU labs. Now we are moving towards a commercial product, and the performance is impressive.”

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K-12 air quality research spotlighted by industry group

Anonymous — Wed, 04 Sep 2024 16:08:45 +0000

K-12 air quality research spotlighted by industry group Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 09/04/2024 - 10:08

Mark Hernandez's air quality research is being highlight by Chemical and Engineering News.

Hernandez is a professor in the Environmental Engineering Program and air quality expert.

The work being spotlighted by C&EN, which is a publication of the American Chemical Society, initially focused on reducing the spread of COVID-19 in Denver Schools during the pandemic. It later expanded beyond concerns of infectious diseases to helping to improve air quality in schools across the board.

Launched in 2022 with funding from the CDC, the project seeks to correlate air quality in classrooms with the number of student absences due to respiratory illness.

The study’s provided portable HEPA air purifiers to classrooms across Colorado. Hernandez and his team installed air quality monitors to measure how well the filters were performing. By the end of 2023, 369 schools were enrolled in the project and agreed to send the researchers anonymous data on student absences.

Read the full article at C&EN...

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Building Blocks

Anonymous — Wed, 31 Jul 2024 19:37:58 +0000

Building Blocks Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 07/31/2024 - 13:37

Prometheus Materials eyes expansion through increased production

Traditional cement production is responsible for about 7 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, making it a significant contributor to climate change.

So faculty at CU Boulder started developing a greener alternative. A Department of Defense-funded project launched in 2016 led to the creation of an eco-friendly cement with a minimal carbon footprint, emitting little to no carbon dioxide and recycling 95 percent of the water used in production.

In 2021, they made the move to commercialize the technology as Prometheus Materials. Founded by Associate Professors Sherri Cook, Mija Hubler and Wil Srubar of civil, environmental and architectural engineering, along with Jeff Cameron of biochemistry and CEO Loren Burnett, the Colorado-based company produces bio-concrete from the biomineralization of blue-green algae in a natural process similar to that which creates sea shells and coral reefs.

While initially focused on research and development, the company has since entered a commercialization phase, exploring the establishment of new facilities to transition from a single production line to multiple lines and to increase production, Hubler said.

“We’re in flux,” she said. “We’re dreaming bigger.”

Product development

Hubler said the “most exciting part” is that Prometheus Materials has successfully scaled production and launched a commercial product for the construction industry.

Initially, the team focused on assessing structural performance, particularly compressive strength. That led to the development of their inaugural product — the ProZero Bio-Block Masonry unit.

After constructing a pilot wall, the researchers put their ears to it and were met with a remarkable silence. Further tests confirmed the product’s efficacy in preventing sound from bouncing off or attenuating through walls. This discovery paved the way for another product, ProZero Sound Attenuation units. Potential uses include sound panels in large conference rooms and classrooms.

The researchers also evaluated the product’s suitability for pedestrian and parking surfaces, analyzing its response to environmental moisture. The outcomes were positive, prompting the development of a third product.

Proof points

Mija Hubler with the Prometheus algae-growing system.

But consumers can’t yet walk into a hardware store and buy a ProZero product off the shelf.

While Prometheus Materials has performed some pilot studies with large companies like Microsoft and has discussed potential applications for its products in Microsoft’s offices and warehouses, it will take years before the products will be available in places like Home Depot.

Hubler emphasized that the construction industry prefers “tried and true” materials and is cautious to adopt new ones. Larger construction firms play a crucial role in pioneering and embracing innovative products, serving as trailblazers to introduce these newer products into the market.

But there are multiple reasons why it’s the right time for the company to expand operations.

“The construction industry, building owners and developers are paying a lot more attention to carbon emissions, and our materials have reduced emissions,” Srubar said. “[Another] driver is the trend toward nature-based materials that don’t contain any ‘red list’ chemicals in them.”

Cook added that many companies have ambitious corporate sustainability goals but lack practical means to achieve them. Prometheus Materials provides a tangible avenue for these companies to start realizing their sustainability objectives.

Srubar echoed the strategic importance of working with these firms, whose teams of architects and engineers collaborate in designing and engineering structures using innovative materials.

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Climate change causing increase in metals concentrations in streams

Anonymous — Fri, 24 May 2024 22:45:43 +0000

Climate change causing increase in metals concentrations in streams Anonymous (not verified) Fri, 05/24/2024 - 16:45

Diane McKnight's alpine stream research is highlighted in a new article published in the Aspen Times.

The piece focuses on newly published research demonstrating climate-driven increases in stream metal concentrations in the Colorado Rocky Mountains, including Lincoln Creek above Aspen.

McKnight, a distinguished professor in the Environmental Engineering Program and the Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research, is an expert on aquatic ecology and the interactions between hydrologic, chemical and biological processes in aquatic systems.

McKnight has been measuring the pH levels of the upper Snake River in Summit County for decades. On a recent trip with students, a stream that usually had a pH level of about 4 measured 2.75, meaning the acidity had greatly increased.

“I said: Wait, the probe must be wrong, the probe must be broken,” she said. “Guess what, the probe was not broken. … The public should be aware the world is changing, and there are surprises.”

Read the full article at the Aspen Times...

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CU Boulder leading effort to improve water quality in Rockies’ rivers

Anonymous — Thu, 04 Apr 2024 21:50:45 +0000

CU Boulder leading effort to improve water quality in Rockies’ rivers Anonymous (not verified) Thu, 04/04/2024 - 15:50

Jeff Zehnder

Video: How the Mortenson Center at CU Boulder is Improving Water Security

Kat Demaree and Jason Quinn installing an in-situ water quality tool with multiple sensors providing near-continuous measurements of turbidity, chlorophyl-a, conductivity, and fluorescing dissolved organic matter (fDOM) along the Yampa River near Steamboat Springs.

Using machine learning for better water quality

�鶹��Ƶ and Colorado State University researchers are teaming up to improve river water quality in the Rockies.

A team led by Environmental Engineering Professor Evan Thomas has received a $650,000 Convergence Accelerator grant from the National Science Foundation, to measure and mitigate pollution in the Cache la Poudre and Yampa Rivers in Colorado through new sensor technology, monitoring, and a voluntary carbon credits trading system with industry.

The Convergence Accelerator grant complements other Thomas-led initiatives also working to improve water quality. The work has also been funded by the Moore Foundation and the Walton Family Foundation. Thomas was influential in scoping the $160 million dollar NSF funded Colorado-Wyoming Regional Innovation Engine, and recently received a United States Congressional earmark directed-grant from NASA also targeted at the Yampa and Poudre rivers.

Thomas has been working with Colorado State Senators Cleave Simpson and Jeff Bridges, and the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment to advance legislation that could accelerate watershed restoration in Colorado by pairing wastewater utility water quality obligations under the Clean Water Act with restorative programs.

A central component of these projects is the use of ongoing, instream water quality measurements that will allow the team the ability to trace back negative changes, said Thomas, who also serves as director of the Mortenson Center in Global Engineering and Resilience.

“Typically, this work is done with point-in-time measurements when someone goes out and manually takes a sample, which is very expensive and infrequent. These new sensors we have are robust and durable and will allow us to do things continuously,” Thomas said.

The sensor data, enabled by a partnership with Fort Collins based sensor company In-Situ, will be fed into a machine learning system to develop predictive models that can track pollution and determine sources.

“Machine learning and AI aren’t new, but we’re applying these techniques in a place they haven’t been applied before – managing watersheds and enabling climate finance to pay for ongoing performance,” Thomas said.

Fernando Rosario-Ortiz, a professor of environmental engineering at CU Boulder and co-investigator on the project, said the grant builds on a wealth of earlier research.

"I am excited about taking all we have learned about wildfires and water quality and focusing now on how we can proactively work with communities to limit these impacts and the stresses they have on water infrastructure," Rosario-Ortiz said.

Being able to track back pollution sources has been a long-sought goal of environmental

Evan Thomas

researchers. While it is simple to monitor pollution coming from fixed-point sources, like the outlet of a wastewater treatment plant, it is much harder to analyze diffuse sources, like runoff from industrial agriculture, mining, or forestry operations.

“It has been a technology barrier, and regulators have been reluctant to approve water quality projects that are hard to measure,” Thomas said. “We hope to change this. We’re working with landowners, stakeholders, and cities to make positive changes for restorative agriculture, irrigation, and wildfire management.”

In addition to water researchers at CU Boulder and CSU, the team has built a network of outside partners, including the cities of Steamboat Springs and Fort Collins, Friends of the Yampa, and Coalition for the Poudre River Watershed, as well as Virridy Inc., a CU Boulder spinout company that develops global water security programs.

A second key part of the project is a voluntary carbon market that aims to build industry investment in green infrastructure to improve water quality. Although the project is just getting underway, Mortenson Construction has already purchased $2 million in credits through it. Thomas said this market could generate as many as 1.6 billion carbon credits per year.

Thomas has been involved in large scale drinking water treatment carbon credit programs in Africa over the last 15 years, reaching over 5 million people with improved water security. This represents the first major effort in the United States.

“This is a way for industry and companies to demonstrate to shareholders and customers they’re committed to climate impact,” Thomas said. “It takes local water problems and brings them into the global market, creating business opportunities.”

In addition to Thomas and Rosario-Ortiz, the team at CU Boulder includes Kat Demaree, environmental engineer and doctoral student. At Colorado State University, the effort is being led by Matt Ross, an assistant professor of ecosystem science and sustainability, and Jason Quinn, a professor of mechanical engineering. Also involved in the project is Krister Andersson, a sustainable development professor at Notre Dame who previously was a CU Boulder faculty member.

Using machine learning for better water quality. �鶹��Ƶ and Colorado State University researchers are teaming up to improve river water quality in the...

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Scientists advocate for policies regulating indoor air

Anonymous — Mon, 01 Apr 2024 20:19:25 +0000

Scientists advocate for policies regulating indoor air Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 04/01/2024 - 14:19

A group of international experts, including CU Boulder’s Jose-Luis Jimenez, CIRES Fellow and distinguished chemistry professor, and Shelly Miller, mechanical engineering professor, presented a blueprint for national indoor quality standards for public buildings, in a paper published today in Science.

“The science is very clear that improving indoor air quality would have enormous health benefits by reducing both disease transmission and indoor pollution,” Jimenez said. “But we think that will only happen with legally binding standards.”

The authors addressed setting standards for three key indoor pollutants: carbon dioxide (CO₂), carbon monoxide (CO), and PM2.5, which are particles that can lodge deep in the lungs and enter the bloodstream. In addition to the three pollutants, the authors suggest a fourth standard surrounding ventilation rates.

Jimenez and Miller, along with lead author Lidia Morawska, a distinguished professor at Queensland University of Technology, are internationally known for leading the appeal to the World Health Organization (WHO) to recognize the airborne transmission of COVID-19 early in the pandemic. The group has continued to study and publish papers about indoor air quality in public spaces.

“Indoor air in public buildings is a shared public good, just like outdoor air or drinking water,” said Miller. “To protect public goods from exploitation by polluters who may disregard human health impacts it is critical to provide guidelines and standards, which we have for outdoor air and drinking water.”

The authors recommend that indoor air quality standards be incorporated into the design of new buildings, or in the retrofitting of old structures— which will not be cheap.

“While there is a cost in the short term, the social and economic benefits to public health, wellbeing, and productivity will likely far outweigh the investment in cost in achieving clean indoor air,” Morawska said.

The authors wrote that initial progress could be simple and cost-effective: CO₂sensors are readily available, inexpensive, and robust and could be used as a proxy for the presence of exhaled pathogens such as the SARS-CoV-2 virus, and for the accumulation of indoor chemical pollutants.

If policymakers respond to the scientists’ call to action, Jimenez knows change won’t happen overnight.

“What we are talking about is going to take a generation,” Jimenez said. “Just as it took many decades to provide clean water after the discovery that cholera was waterborne in the 1850s.”

This story was adapted from Queensland University of Technology’s press release.

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Can air purifiers help keep kids in school? New study seeks to find out

Anonymous — Wed, 27 Sep 2023 19:42:51 +0000

Can air purifiers help keep kids in school? New study seeks to find out Anonymous (not verified) Wed, 09/27/2023 - 13:42

Engineers at CU Boulder kicked off a new project this month that aims to investigate whether improving classroom air quality with air purifiers can help students miss fewer school days. The study comes at a time when millions of students across the country are chronically absent from school, a worsening trend that could have large impacts on students’ academic performance.

Mark Hernandez, the SJ Archuleta Professor in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering, is co-leading the project with researchers at the CU Anschutz Medical Campus with a $2.2 million grant the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention awarded this month.

Over the past four months, Hernandez and his team, including eight engineering students, helped install air quality monitors in 2,400 classrooms across Colorado’s K-12 schools. These monitors can provide teachers, school officials and researchers with real-time data on classroom temperature, humidity, CO2 and air pollutant levels.

Mark Hernandez (Credit: CU Boulder)

The team also helped install air cleaners with high-efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filters in tens of thousands of classrooms statewide. These commonly available air purifiers can effectively filter out air pollutants—such as particulate matter from vehicle exhaust and wildfire smoke—that can trigger negative respiratory reactions and remove airborne pathogens like the coronavirus. The team will compare student absenteeism rates in classrooms with air purifiers with those without.

“Linking positive student outcomes to affordable air quality interventions has yet to be done on a large epidemiological scale,” said Hernandez. “I am thankful our flagship engineering college and public health school was chosen by CDC to team up for this work as a national model.”

An epidemic of absenteeism

During the 2022–23 school year, over a third of Colorado K-12 students were chronically absent—defined as missing 10% of the school days in a year. That’s up from one in five students before the pandemic. Students are absent from school for a myriad of reasons—bullying, transportation problems and financial hardship—and asthma stands out as the leading cause of absenteeism due to chronic illness.

Funded by Colorado’s Ryan Innovation Fund, Hernandez started testing air purifiers in Denver Public School (DPS) classrooms in 2020, in an effort to help reopen schools under better conditions during the pandemic.

“When the pandemic broke out, there were a lot of people introducing air purifiers in classrooms. But many of the purifiers weren't sized correctly, didn’t work well or were too loud. No one had systematically assessed the purifiers’ performance in actual educational settings at this scale” Hernandez said.

In 2021, Hernandez and his team installed air purifiers coupled with air quality monitors in 20 public elementary school buildings with funding from the Intel Corporation and the Carrier Company. Most of the schools are located along the I-25 and I-70 highways, and their proximity to high-traffic corridors and industrial zones increases students’ exposure to air pollution, which could worsen the effects of COVID-19. In some of these schools, more than 20% of the students have asthma.

Mark Hernandez (middle) and his students installed air quality monitors and purifiers in Colorado classrooms. (Credit: The Hernandez lab)

The pilot trial’s data showed that the purifiers, when working properly, were effective in improving classroom ventilation and reducing air pollutants. Impressed by the results, DPS funded Hernandez’s team to extend the program to 800 classrooms in 100 schools in 2021.

In 2022, Hernandez received a $5.5 million grant from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment to expand the work state-wide into a new program called Clean Air for Schools. The additional CDC grant will allow the team to continue monitoring air quality in Colorado classrooms and investigate if there is a connection between air purifier operations, ventilation performance and student attendance.

“Until COVID-19, nobody really did anything about air quality in classrooms except in response to extreme weather conditions. Many political leaders and agency decision-makers projected systemic air quality improvements to be too expensive,” Hernandez said.

An inexpensive, but powerful solution

Hernandez estimates that effectively reducing airborne particles in indoor air pollution with air purifiers would cost $65 per student, per classroom, per year.

“Installing a couple of air purifiers in a classroom is cheaper than a textbook, but schools are always strapped for money. Now we have data that shows these commonly available appliances, which don’t disrupt teaching, can be systematically prioritized. It’s well worth it in both the immediate and long term,” Hernandez said.

CU Boulder students set up air monitors in a classroom. (Credit: The Hernandez lab)

The project has a huge community and educational impact, Hernandez added. He is proud of the students and contractors who worked day and night to install the air monitors in thousands of classrooms over the past summer. Many of the young researchers working on the project are first-generation college students who come from communities disproportionately affected by air pollution and COVID-19. Studies have found that Black and Hispanic students have the highest asthma rates in the U.S.

“A few of my students actually attended these schools near the industrial zones, and they are able to give back to the community with their education,” Hernandez said. The diverse group of students will continue to track the data and analyze air quality’s impact on absenteeism using the new grant.

“While I’m an engineer, I’m also an educator. Through this project, I get to work with our engineering students and watch them increase their skills and competence and advance their educational potential while doing something good for the community. This is one of the most rewarding projects I've had in nearly 30 years here at CU,” Hernandez said.

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CU Boulder water quality expertise goes international in Armenia

Anonymous — Mon, 07 Aug 2023 15:03:30 +0000

CU Boulder water quality expertise goes international in Armenia Anonymous (not verified) Mon, 08/07/2023 - 09:03

Jeff Zehnder

Above: Carlo Salvinelli and Kat Demaree reviewing equipment with a representative from Armenia.
Header Photo: The CU Boulder Team and Armenian representatives on the shore of Lake Sevan.

Program Goals/Objectives

The five-year USAID “Armenia Improved Water Management for Sustainable Economic Growth” Program is implemented by "Deloitte Consulting" jointly with the the Urban Foundation for Sustainable Development, the �鶹��Ƶ and REC Caucasus.

The Program seeks to transform Armenia’s approach to water management to improve the equity of access to water while maintaining environmental flow and water quality for the protection of freshwater resources.

It involves the development and dissemination of improved approaches and tools to support sustainable and secure water management; advancing improved water governance; and spreading best practices and innovative approaches in water conservation and use.

The Program’s technical activities encompass the following objectives:

Apply advanced technologies and tools to support sustainable and secure water management
Improve water governance
Promote and scale best practices and innovative approaches in water conservation and use to increase equitable access to water resources
Prepare for regional cooperation with neighboring countries
Improve access to water

�鶹��Ƶ researchers are advancing water resource management in the South Caucasus through a partnership with Deloitte Consulting.

The professional services firm is implementing a US Agency for International Development Armenia activity titled Armenia Improved Water Management for Sustainable Economic Growth program and is tapping CU Boulder’s environmental engineering technical expertise to improve river, lake, and groundwater management in the former Soviet Bloc country.

Deloitte has a longstanding relationship with CU Boulder that includes the joint Climate Innovation Collaboratory, founded last year. On the Armenia activity, Deloitte issued to CU Boulder researchers a five-year, $641,000 subcontract.

“We’re making recommendations on technology and methods that can improve Armenia’s water resources,” said Evan Thomas, an associate professor, director of the Mortenson Center in Global Engineering & Resilience and the principal investigator on the contract.

At Deloitte, their Chief of Party Armen Varosyan said the overall project represents a major opportunity for Armenia.

“We are excited for the potential to bring innovative international technology solutions to Armenia’s water sector,” Varosyan said.

Much of Armenia’s current water infrastructure dates back to its time as part of the Soviet Union. Thomas and a team of CU Boulder researchers recently returned from a 10-day trip to the country, where they met stakeholders and visited key sites, including Lake Sevan, the largest body of water in Armenia.

“It’s a gorgeous country. It’s not dissimilar from Colorado, with mountainous areas and a lot of agriculture,” said Kat Demaree, a project manager and CU Boulder environmental engineering PhD student who was part of the delegation.

Outflow from Lake Sevan is a key source of hydroelectric power and water for agriculture in the country, and was one focus of the visit.

“The lake water level has declined significantly because of overuse,” Demaree said. “Historically there’s not a ton of monitoring of water sources there. They want to better understand how much water they have, where it’s going, who is using it, and how it’s being used.”

Those are important questions familiar to water resource managers all over the world. Demaree said emerging technology makes finding the answers much easier than before.

“They have similar issues that we do here in Colorado – overpumping, overuse. We have software now to help people make decisions and look into the impact of building new infrastructure, new reservoirs, new diversions. We can model the effects of regulations. In Armenia we did a training on Riverware, a modeling program developed at CU Boulder,” she said.

In addition to leveraging engineering expertise, the team is also hoping to boost engineering education in Armenia. They met with faculty at multiple universities there to discuss potential collaborations.

“We want to help build classroom modules and credits specific to the needs of students there, things like water management in agriculture,” Demaree said.

The ultimate goal is to expand the country’s homegrown population of engineers.

As the program progresses, the team will be working to develop relationships with experts in the country, map out official recommendations, and implement infrastructure pilot projects.

“There are a lot of different technology options and solutions, and everything has advantages and disadvantages,” Thomas said. “We’re really working to build partnerships, to build those connections in Armenia to offer the right solutions that will work for them.

Additional CU Boulder faculty researchers involved in the project include Karl Linden,Amy Javernick-Will, and Carlo Salvinelli, all from the Department of Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering.

�鶹��Ƶ researchers are advancing water resource management in the South Caucasus through a partnership with Deloitte Consulting. The professional services firm is is tapping CU Boulder’s environmental engineering technical expertise to improve river, lake, and groundwater management in the...

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