Kinnickinnic River (Photo by Adam Carr)

This Black Friday, Milwaukee Riverkeeper is encouraging volunteers to #OptOutside as part of REI’s efforts to celebrate the outdoors and its benefits! Volunteers will collect water samples from one of our 14 Emerging Contaminants Monitoring Sites anytime on Friday, November 24, 2017. Samples collected for this project will be analyzed for over 60 compounds including prescription drugs, antibiotics, herbicides, personal care products, and even vanilla and cinnamon.

An emerging contaminant is anything in our rivers and lakes that we don’t typically monitor for but could have a negative impact on the health of our waterways and communities that depend on them. Emerging contaminants such as pharmaceuticals, personal care products, and recreational drugs often enter our rivers and lakes through failing infrastructure or treated wastewater. While we treat our wastewater for human waste and many different harmful substances and microbes, most of our wastewater treatment facilities and techniques were not developed with these chemical compounds in mind. That means, what we decide to consume or even put down our kitchen sinks will eventually make its way into our rivers and Lake Michigan!

This is a collaborative project between the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee – School of Freshwater Sciences, University of Wisconsin Milwaukee – Zilber School of Public Health, Carroll University, Urban Ecology Center, and Milwaukee Riverkeeper.

WHEN
Volunteers will #OptOutside on Black Friday, Friday, November 24, 2017

WHERE
Volunteers will visit one of 14 locations throughout the Milwaukee River Basin, Visit https://milwaukeeriverkeeper.org/become-emerging-contaminants-monitor/ for a map of monitoring sites.