water quality

Water Webinar March 30, 2023

Are you drowning with questions about agricultural water? Join us for our water webinar on March 30! Topics include compliance dates, new assessment tools, and harvest/post-harvest water. Speakers: Indu Upadhyaya, Food Safety Extension Specialist Diane Wright Hirsch, Emeritus Faculty Food Safety Click/tap here or on the flyer above to register!

9 Projects Focus on LIS Marshes, Water Quality, Public Beaches

Long Island Sound water quality, salt marsh and public beach characteristics will be examined by marine and social scientists in nine research projects awarded funding by the Connecticut and New York Sea Grant programs (CTSG and NYSG respectively) and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Long Island Sound Study (LISS) Research Grant Program. These new projects, […]

Job Opening: Water Quality Extension Educator

We are seeking an Assistant/Associate Extension Educator in Water Quality with a 75% extension, 25% research mission split housed within the UConn Center for Land Use Education and Research in Haddam. This joint-appointed position between UConn Extension and the Natural Resources & the Environment in UConn CAHNR begins reviewing applications on April 1st. Full details: […]

Is your water safe to drink?

Posted on December 23, 2019 by Michael Dietz If you are like most people, as long as water comes out of the tap, you don’t give it much thought. If your water is supplied by a water company, stringent testing is required by law, and you will periodically receive results of the testing. If you […]

Conservation Planning

Excess fertilizer use and inefficient nutrient management strategies often are causes of water quality impairment in the United States. When excess nitrogen enters large water bodies it enhances algae growth and when that algae decomposes, hypoxic conditions—often called a “dead zone” occur. Nutrients carried to the Long Island Sound have been linked to the seasonal […]

Private Well Water Testing

Private wells provide water to 820,000 people in Connecticut, approximately 23% of the population’s water supply comes from private wells according to the Connecticut Department of Public Health. These wells are not regulated by the Environmental Protection Agency, although Local Health Departments do have the authority over the proper siting and construction of private wells. […]

Is Your Well Water Contaminated?

Is your well water contaminated with road salt? Dr. Mike Dietz of the Connecticut Institute of Water Resources talked to NBC Connecticut last week about how we can reduce contamination. “‘This is a worldwide problem. It’s a really big problem in the United States because the amount of salt that we’ve been applying has been […]

Is there any hope to fix our salt problem? Perhaps…

Another winter has finally ended, and messy roads and salty cars are quickly becoming a distant memory. Where did all that salt go? The millions of tons of deicing salts that get applied to our roads either wash off into local streams, or move into the local groundwater. Yet another research study has recently come […]

Another Win for Rain Gardens

By Amanda Ryan Originally published by the Center for Land Use Education and Research It’s well known that rain gardens are great for infiltrating stormwater but people may not realize that they also help destroy common stormwater pollutants. Several studies have found that rather than accumulating pollutants in their soils, rain gardens tend to biodegrade […]

What Do You Do After You Scoop?

By David Dickson Originally published by the UConn Center for Land Use Education and Research On my drive home last week I saw two of my neighbors walking their dogs. One of the dogs had just done his business and the owner dutifully scooped it up with a doggy doodie bag dangling from the dog’s […]

NOAA Website Uses CLEAR Technologies

The NOAA Office for Coastal Management has come out with a new web-mapping site, How to Use Land Cover Data as A Water Quality Indicator, that was constructed based on a project that UConn Extension’s Center for Land Use Education and Research (CLEAR) did for them in 2013. It uses metrics and analyses recommended by CLEAR, and in […]

Road Salt Use in Connecticut: Balancing Safety & Water Quality

This conference is being organized by the NEMO Program, an outreach program of the UConn Center for Land Use Education and Research.   Additional support provided by the Connecticut Institute for Water Resources   Friday March 28, 2014 8:30 am – 3:00 pm UConn Student Union    REGISTER    Chloride use in winter deicing has been steadily increasing. […]

Salt of the Earth

UConn Extension’s Center for Land Use Education And Research (CLEAR) provides information, education and assistance to Connecticut’s land use decision makers, community organizations and citizens on how to better protect natural resources while accommodating economic growth. Read Michael Dietz’s blog post about road salt at the CLEAR website. One of UConn’s salt piles.

New Rain Garden Smartphone App Helps Protect Water Quality

By:  Sheila Foran, UConn Today & David Dickson, UConn Extension The Center for Land Use Education and Research (CLEAR), a partnership between Extension and  NRE in the College of Agriculture and Natural Resources and CT Sea Grant, has developed the Rain Garden smart phone app in Apple’s iTunes store. It is the University’s first mobile […]