NRS Invited Seminar Series: Climate change and source water quality

Drinking water systems are vulnerable to events such as floods, droughts and intense storms that wash in contaminants to surface water. Communities need ways to evaluate and mitigate the effects of events that are expected to become more frequent in a future climate. This presentation presents the primary concerns about climate change from a drinking water perspective and proposes a methodology that can be used to improve vulnerability assessments for municipal water systems and solutions to respond to events that degrade water quality.

Sarah Dorner, Associate Professor in the Department of Civil, Geological and Mining Engineering at Polytechnique Montréal, has held the Canada Research Chair on Source Water Protection from 2007-2019. As a member of the CREDEAU at Polytechnique Montréal, a consortium focused on the whole urban water cycle, she conducts research on novel technologies aiming to ensure safe drinking water supplies for communities. Prof. Dorner is leading projects on of green infrastructure for stormwater control and climate change adaptation, rapid online monitoring tools for identifying periods of highest risk for drinking water contamination, and metagenomics of microbial contaminants (potential pathogens and toxin producing cyanobacteria) in drinking water supplies.

Attend on Zoom