EXPERTS ADVISORY

ANN ARBOR—Aug. 2 is the one-year anniversary of the Toledo water crisis, when high levels of a bacterial toxin shut down the drinking water supply to more than 400,000 people. The University of Michigan has several experts who can discuss the event and harmful Lake Erie cyanobacterial blooms in general.

Don Scavia, aquatic ecologist and director of U-M’s Graham Sustainability Institute. He is a member of the multi-institution team that issued a harmful algal bloom forecast for Lake Erie on July 9, calling for a severe bloom of blue-green algae in Lake Erie this summer. Scavia also served on research teams that issued hypoxia forecasts this year for the Gulf of Mexico and the Chesapeake Bay.

“These blooms are driven by diffuse phosphorus sources from the agriculturally dominated Maumee River watershed,” Scavia said. “We cannot continue to cross our fingers and hope that seasonal fluctuations in weather will keep us safe. Until the phosphorus inputs are reduced significantly and consistently so only the mildest blooms occur, the people, ecosystem and economy of this region are being threatened.”

Contact: 734-615-4860, scavia@umich.edu. Recent U-M video: myumi.ch/a0WQk

Greg Dick, a marine microbiologist and oceanographer and an associate professor in the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences. Dick is leading a multidisciplinary project that uses state-of-the-art genomics and environmental chemistry techniques to explore factors controlling the toxicity of Lake Erie cyanobacterial blooms.

“We know what causes these blooms: It’s nutrients from farm runoff. What we don’t fully understand is what determines whether these cyanobacterial blooms are highly toxic or not,” Dick said.

Contact: 734-763-3228, gdick@umich.edu. Recent U-M video: myumi.ch/JdO4w

Tom Johengen, a research scientist at the Cooperative Institute for Limnology and Ecosystems Research. Johengen said U-M and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have been monitoring Lake Erie cyanobacterial blooms since 2008. This year, in response to the Toledo incident, several changes to the monitoring program were made. Water samples are now collected at the surface and several meters below it, at the depths of municipal water intakes; both particulate and dissolved microcystin toxin are now measured; a network of NOAA monitoring buoys was expanded and now provides real-time information about western Lake Erie conditions; and additional observing data from other academic and private-sector partners were added to the program.

“Having continuous monitoring data that can relay information back on hourly and finer time scales is very important to understanding the rapidly changing conditions in events like last year’s Toledo incident,” Johengen said.

Contact: 734-741-2203, johengen@umich.edu. Recent U-M video: myumi.ch/LPlbo

Gary Fahnenstiel, a research scientist at the U-M Water Center. Fahnenstiel has more than 35 years of experience working on algae in the Great Lakes and has published more than 150 scientific papers, including more than 10 papers on the causes and consequences of harmful algal blooms in the Great Lakes and specifically in Lake Erie and Saginaw Bay. Before joining U-M, he was a research scientist at the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration’s Ann Arbor laboratory, where he led the NOAA/GLERL Harmful Algal Bloom Program in the Great Lakes.

“The resurgence of harmful algae blooms in western Lake Erie over the last decade or so is attributable to at least three factors. One is the flow of phosphorus from agricultural land. The other factors that are often overlooked are climate change and invasive mussels. Climate change and the quagga and zebra mussels have changed the way Lake Erie responds to the nutrients flowing into the lake from croplands. It’s not simply a nutrient story. It’s more complicated than that, and it’s not going to be a trivial undertaking to get rid of these harmful algal blooms.”

Fahnenstiel can be reached at 906-395-1510 or fahnenst@umich.edu.