InSites is a quarterly newsletter that highlights the personalities and projects of the Waste Management Research and Education Institute (WMREI) of The University of Tennessee. WMREI is an affiliate of the EERC.
WMREI was created in 1985 as a state-funded Center of Excellence. Research areas include solid-, hazardous-, and nuclear-waste management; waste minimization; and pollution prevention.
Biotechnology is the focal point of the institute's technical research, while issues involving public attitudes and federal/state policies related to waste-management issues are the primary concerns of the institute's policy research.
For additional information about InSites, or to be added to our mailing list, please write InSites, WMREI, The University of Tennessee, 311 Conference Building, Knoxville, TN 37996-4134, call 865-974-1156, or fax 865-974-1838. Or, if you prefer, email us.
Table of Contents
WMREI Grants Fund
Environmental Research
Sleuthing the Storm Drains
,
Kris Christen
Rebirth
of a Stream Collaborative
Planning,
Elise LeQuire
Staff Citings 
WMREI Grants
Fund Environmental Research
The newest recipients of annual research policy grants awarded by the University of Tennessee’s (UT) Waste Management Research and Education Institute (WMREI) will tackle some of the state’s more pressing environmental problems. This year’s grant research focuses on a range of topics, including regional air pollution, public attitudes on sewage sludge, invasive species, industrial supply chains, consumption patterns, and educational outreach.
As a state center of excellence, WMREI carries out research under two divisions—the environmental science and biotechnology division and the policy division. The goal of the latter is “to assist decision makers in addressing important waste management and environmental issues facing the state of Tennessee,” says Jack Barkenbus, WMREI policy director and executive director of UT’s Energy, Environment and Resources Center (EERC). “With the seed money we’ve received over the years, we’ve been able to assist various administrations considerably in many of the environmental efforts they’ve undertaken.”
Barkenbus points to two initiatives in particular that were funded by past WMREI grants and which led to signifi- cant payoffs for the state. One involves WMREI’s contribution to Tennessee’s Solid Waste Management Act of 1991, which set a goal of reducing by a quarter the amount of waste disposed by the state. WMREI continues to provide educational outreach services associated with that Act. Another successful WMREIfunded initiative contributed to drafting Tennessee’s Interbasin Water Transfer Act of 2000, which gives the state the power to regulate diversions of surface and groundwater from one basin to another.
“We continue to seek other opportunities to have this kind of positive impact on the state,” Barkenbus says. Total funding for fiscal year 2004 projects— just over $320,000—is down by about 9 percent over last year’s levels du to the state’s current budgetary situation, he notes. A brief description of the latest WMREI projects follows. These projects will be carried out by researchers and faculty members from across the university.
AIR POLLUTION
Control of toxic air pollutants that have been tied either to respiratory disease
or cancer has become a major issue for Tennessee, according to Gregory Reed,
head of UT’s department of civil and environmental engineering. Using
air-quality models his department has already developed for the state, Reed
is leading a project to identify which types of emissions are likely to have
caused certain health problems in the state’s air-pollution “hot
spots.”
“We plan to illustrate where potential problem areas lie and then analyze various policies that could reduce and control these emissions to improve health effects,” Reed says.
Along similar lines, Michael McKee, a professor with UT’s economics department, is designing a number of policy scenarios to address air-quality issues in East Tennessee, which suffers from some of the worst air pollution in the nation. These options, such as requiring vehicle emissions inspections or installation of additional air scrubbers on power plants, all entail a cost, says McKee, and will require public support to be successful. McKee and his colleagues are developing the various policy alternatives, which will be distilled into a mail-out survey. The survey will ask respondents to rank these options. Their responses will help McKee determine which options would have the greatest public support.
INVASIVE SPECIES
Invasive plants are taking over more areas, control costs are rising, and communities
are failing to keep up with the threat they pose, says Jack Ranney, an EERC
ecologist. One of the projects he is leading seeks to establish Knoxville as
a prototype for community-based management plans for controlling invasive species.
“The idea is for communities to start addressing these issues now,” says Ranney. “Doing so will allow these communities to save money in the long run while protecting important resources like natural areas, greenways, and historic sites.”
Through another WMREI grant, Ranney is helping position UT as a primary research resource for Great Smoky Mountains National Park (GSMNP). The Park has sought UT support in addressing its ambitious research agenda. Ranney will also help coordinate park-related research with other area universities.
“We’re trying to get a more cohesive picture together, to look at what the most important issues are and who the best people in the region are to solve them,” Ranney says. “Our immediate goal is to support increased interaction between the Smokies and the region’s academic institutions, but in a larger way, we want to get the Southern Appalachians more on the map for doing science.”
INDUSTRIAL SUPPLY CHAINS
Jack Geibig, an EERC senior research associate, is spearheading an effort to
help companies across a range of industrial sectors integrate environmental
considerations into the choices they make throughout the product design and
production cycle.
“Design choices often result when someone chooses a material based on certain criteria, but all too often, environmental performance isn’t one of them,” Geibig says. He and his colleagues will help industries establish environmentally sustainable supply chains.
Building on research assessing what drives consumers to buy certain unsustainable products such as sport utility vehicles, Mary English, an EERC research leader, is now delving into the conditions that affect sustainable consumption by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). DOE makes two major types of investments in environmental sustainability—namely in the remediation of its nuclear weapons complex and in research on sustainable energy technologies, according to English. English’s project will analyze how various conditions interact to drive investment decisions toward sustainability or away from it.
Public perception of health risks associated with exposure to biosolids, or treated sewage sludge, has made land application of these substances an increasingly controversial practice, says Kevin Robinson, an associate professor with UT’s civil and environmental engineering department. In fact, public opposition has shut down such applications in a number of areas within the United States, making biosolids management a pressing waste issue.
Preliminary survey research has indicated that people are much less concerned about exposure to animal manure used in this way, despite the fact that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency considers health risks associated with exposure to manure to be higher than those associated with exposure to biosolids. Robinson and his colleagues are conducting research to evaluate how exposure and risk perception relates to attitudes concerning animal manure and biosolids recycling. Such research will help shape waste management and policy decisions concerning the use of these materials as part of a sustainable resource strategy.
EDUCATIONAL OUTREACH
Several of this year’s grants are geared toward environmental education,
which is one of WMREI’s core missions. Kim Davis, WMREI’s assistant
director, is overseeing distribution of five $3,000 stipends to graduate students
in civil and environmental engineering, microbiology, sociology, and geological
sciences. Davis is also involved in a WMREIfunded program designed to bring
together undergraduate minority students from the United States and South Africa
to study extreme bacteria in South Africa’s gold mines. The program, which
offers students experience in field laboratory logistics and research, also
receives funding from the National Science Foundation.
Don Huisingh, an EERC senior scientist in sustainable development, is organizing workshops and course material to “educate the educators” in sustainable development. The program teaches higher education professionals the background and concepts of, and tools for, teaching sustainability. The goal of the workshops is to help participants integrate the principles and practices of sustainability into their own course curricula. Huisingh has conducted such workshops in multiple locations around the world, including a course he coordinated at UT in July. Similar courses planned for the coming year specifically target faculty in the southeastern United States.
Sheila Webster, director of the EERC’s Technology Research and Development Program, is leading a project to put a comprehensive environmental literacy test on the World Wide Web for use by colleges and universities. The test, which was developed by former EERC Associate Director Rosalyn McKeown through an earlier WMREI grant, is made up of four components, including natural science, social science, environmental issues, and behavior. In a pilot test currently underway, a Florida university is testing its freshman class and eventually hopes to give the test to its seniors as well to assess how effective the university’s programs are at increasing students’ environmental literacy. Webster is also conducting a study on the availability of games, simulations, and other online interactive learning activities within the environmental field. Based on her findings, Webster hopes to organize an EERC team to develop and refine these activities.
In another project, Kim Davis will document the historical ecology of Knoxville’s rich, diverse urban forest over the last 150 years. According to Davis, economic growth, lack of attention to tree planting codes, and a general public apathy toward protecting older trees have converged to threaten Knoxville’s urban tree canopy. Davis plans to assemble her work into a book to draw attention to how these trees and other green spaces benefit the city. Looking ahead, Barkenbus is exploring new areas for WMREI-funded research. These include the development of hydrogen as an alternative fuel and the environmental impacts of nanotechnology. Overall, “we’re looking for areas that haven’t been fully explored, that present an opportunity for researchers, and that can contribute to the environmental health and welfare of the state and possibly the nation,” Barkenbus says.
* * *
For more information contact Jack Barkenbus,
EERC, The University of Tennessee, 311 Conference Center Building, Knoxville,
TN 37996-4134, or call 865-974-4251.
A WMREI intern helps Knoxville monitor water quality in the city’s storm drain system.
By Kris Christen
When rain falls, debris found on streets and parking lots gets washed down storm drains and transported, untreated, into nearby lakes, streams, and wetlands where it can pollute the water, kill fish, and close beaches. This rush of stormwater carries things like oil, antifreeze, gasoline, sediments, pet wastes, fertilizers, pesticides, leaves, and grass clippings.
Raw sewage overflowing from municipal sanitary sewers represents another particularly nasty contaminant and is often caused by blockages or breaks in underground piping systems that, under normal conditions, would transport this waste to treatment plants.
As a result of a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) mandate to reduce water pollution from storm drains, David Hagerman, stormwater quality manager in Knoxville, Tennessee, and his section of the city’s engineering department are responsible for monitoring water quality in the city’s storm drain system. Assisting Hagerman in this effort is Shannon Efteland, a University of Tennessee (UT) graduate student in microbiology. Efteland’s work for the city is funded through UT’s Waste Management Research and Education Institute (WMREI).
Kim Davis, WMREI’s assistant director, has overseen the institute’s internship program since 1998. “David and I had known each other through the Tennessee Society of Professional Engineers and had often discussed the issues facing the city’s stormwater division,” says Davis. At the time, WMREI was looking for a way to expand its educational outreach.
Davis and Hagerman realized then that the creation of an internship program between the city and WMREI would mutually benefit both groups.
“Not only has it provided a great opportunity for UT students to gain realworld experience in environmental management,” Davis says, “it also provides the city’s stormwater division with motivated manpower for the multitude of tasks required to maintain water quality.”
Efteland will help city staff sample storm drain outflows and trace the sources of illicit discharges, the highest percentage of which come from sanitary sewer overflows (SSOs), according to Hagerman. Such raw sewage often carries bacteria, viruses, and other disease-causing pathogens, and as a result, city creeks often fail federal bacteria standards. Efteland's job will also involve helping the city post signs along creeks, warning people against physical contact with the water due to bacterial contamination.
DETECTIVE WORK
In response to the EPA mandate, Knoxville hired an ex-Central Intelligence Agency
official in February to fly over the city’s waterways, taking aerial photographs
using heat-seeking technology. The resulting images depict hot spots where water
is warmer than the surrounding waters. By matching this data with geographic
information, Efteland helps the city identify where potential problem areas
lie.
“The majority of the hotspots are turning out to be springs,” Hagerman says. “This makes sense because the groundwater coming out of these springs is warmer than the surface waters during the winter time.” But other hotspots are lining up perfectly with sewer manholes on adjacent creek banks.
One focus of this project “is to make sure that there’s nothing, either in the storm drain system or in the sewer system, that’s openly leaking out into the creek and causing recurrent problems that we’re not really aware of,” Efteland says. The other is to find and identify specific characteristics of the creeks.
UTILITY CHALLENGES
Through such investigations, the city discovered that the actual number of SSOs
may have exceeded the reported quantity for the past few years. Consequently,
the state and EPA underestimated the problem until recently, when the city and
citizen groups started getting involved and reporting the SSOs that they were
observing, Hagerman says. “I see overflows as an indicator of pipe health
underground,” Hagerman says.
“If massive overflows are occurring, that means you’re taking on a lot of groundwater during rain events through cracks in the system.” This large influx of water surcharges the sewer system, causing water to pump out through any holes or cracks. But it also means that during dry weather, when the groundwater level has dropped back down, undiluted sewage continues to seep out through the holes or cracks.
The latter case, according to Hagerman, “is even more dangerous, because that’s what’s maintaining elevated bacteria levels in our creeks during dry weather.” In Hagerman’s view, the large number of SSOs—280 in 2002 alone— are a sign of chronic underinvestment in the city’s sewer system.
SSOs are, in fact, illegal under the federal Clean Water Act, and utilities are required by permit to maintain their systems’ integrity. Paul Davis, director of the water pollution control division of Tennessee’s Department of Environment and Conservation (TDEC), notes, however, “that there’s not a town in Tennessee that doesn’t have an overflow sooner or later. The real question,” he says, “is the magnitude, frequency, and duration.”
To get the SSOs in Knoxville cleaned up and fixed, Efteland has also been helping the city to document when and where SSOs have occurred. In addition, she’s looking at other, comparably sized cities in EPA’s Region 4 area, which includes Knoxville, in terms of how many SSOs they experience and how much money they spend on sewage infrastructure by comparison.
Under an agreement TDEC signed with Knoxville Utility Board (KUB) in May, the utility will develop a plan for fixing the SSO problems, implement the plan, and provide opportunities for the public to participate in the process, according to Paul Davis. Additionally, TDEC has stipulated that all SSOs must be cleaned up by 2011.
To reach these goals, KUB is now spending $1 million per month to upgrade its system, according to Wayne Loveday, director of KUB’s treatment plants and collection system. Additionally, the utility is evaluating all of the SSOs from 2001 to 2002 and developing corrective action plans for dealing with them. Paul Davis says he is confident that the utility will follow through on its end of the deal.
All in all, the WMREI internship has been a win-win-win opportunity, according to Hagerman. Efteland has gained some valuable on-the-job experience, city storm water quality is improving, and the city has gotten some extra help in its endeavors, as well as some new insight.
“Shannon has been extremely valuable to us because, here in the engineering department, none of us is a microbiologist,” Hagerman explains. “She’s given us a different perspective on some of the impacts that storm water has on human health and aquatic life.”
* * *
For more information contact Kim Davis, WMREI, The University of Tennessee, 311 Conference Center Building, Knoxville, TN 37996-4134, or call 865-974-7847.
IN 1957, WITH THE BLESSING OF THE Game and Fish Commission of Tennessee and the National Park Service, workers fanned out along Abrams Creek, from Abrams Falls all the way down to its juncture with the Little Tennessee River, and poisoned the waters with the piscicide Rotenone. The operation was timed to coincide with the closing of Chilhowee Dam to create a lake that would provide electricity to ALCOA aluminum company and excellent trout fishing to anglers.
This massive fish kill was part of a management scheme designed, says David Etnier, to improve rainbow trout populations, an introduced species prized by anglers. Etnier is an emeritus professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Tennessee (UT) who remains active in monitoring the diversity of aquatic species in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. At the time, managing for fishing basically meant killing everything and restocking the streams with sport fish. “This was the philosophy of the day. If I had been there, I would have never said a word about it,” Etnier says.
Prior to the kill, biologists conducted a baseline survey of the creek and accounted for nearly 60 different species of fish. Only about half of these recovered on their own by recolonizing from tributaries that were not treated with Rotenone. Among the extirpated species were smoky madtoms and yellowfin madtoms—small members of the catfish family—duskytail darters, and spotfin chubs, all of which have since been listed as threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act. In fact, the smoky madtom was newly identified from specimens collected after the kill and thus declared extinct upon discovery. The yellowfin madtom was also considered extinct.
Spawn of a New Era
The creation of Chilhowee Lake essentially fragmented the habitat of these small-
to medium-size stream species, which thrive in free-flowing waters. In the 1970s
and 1980s, however, biologists found remnant populations of the smoky madtom,
yellowfin madtom, and the duskytail darter in a small tributary of the Little
Tennessee, Citico Creek in Cherokee National Forest, and spotfin chubs in the
Little Tennessee River above the reservoirs in North Carolina. Etnier identified
these species as good candidates for a project to restore the native fish fauna
to Abrams Creek.
Since the remnant populations of these species were so small, however, captive breeding of these fish was determined to be the preferred method of obtaining stock. Under Etnier’s tutelage, the first attempts at captive breeding were undertaken by UT graduate students Patrick Rakes, J.R. Shute, and Peggy Shute.
When Rakes and J.R. Shute left the university, they founded Conservation Fisheries, Inc. (CFI) as a nonprofit organization to continue the captive propagation program with the help of the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
At CFI’s facilities in Knoxville, Tennessee, stock taken from the wild is raised in tanks in a laboratory where the light is manipulated to mimic natural conditions. The tanks’ water temperature is adjusted to provide the seasonal variation the fish will experience when they are released. Slabs of tile, gravel, sand, pebbles and stones, and even nests of yarn, provide artificial habitat similar to the cobble sands, slab rocks, flat rocks, and aquatic vegetation where the wild fish thrive.
After more than15 years of work, the restoration project in Abrams Creek is nearly completed. “In the past two years, we have seen a lot of wild reproduction in three of the species,” says Rakes. Snorkeling surveys reveal that the madtoms are successfully reproducing. “Last year, we saw more young smoky madtoms than in all earlier years combined,” Rakes says. And since 1995, CFI has found signs of wild reproduction of duskytail darters, including nests and young, spawned fry. “That fish is doing well,” he says. “We could walk away and consider it established.” A few spotfin chubs have also spawned in Abrams Creek.
Stocking occurs at sites upstream from Abrams Creek Campground, downstream near the mouth of Abrams Creek above Chilhowee Lake, and in waters that flow through the campground. “The Abrams Creek campground area is ideal,” Rakes says, though he has seen evidence of serious habitat alteration, as visitors playing in the creek construct dams out of cobbles and slab rocks. “These species are almost gone from the Earth,” Rakes says. “We need to make a concerted effort to tiptoe around them.”
Restoring Habitat
Abrams Creek was considered ideal for restoring these native fish because the
pH is close to neutral—thanks to the limestone substrate of Cades Cove—and
Abrams’ warmer waters are more conducive to spawning than are higher elevation
streams. Abrams Creek also has a variety of special habitat niches each of the
species prefers and an abundance of their preferred food—midges, gnat
larvae, and the larval stages of aquatic insects such as mayflies, stoneflies,
and caddisflies.
Some portions of the creek, however, have in the past suffered from high levels of sedimentation and eroded streambanks, especially in Cades Cove, where cattle had been allowed access to the creek. Field surveys in 1991 and 1992 revealed that stream bank erosion and loss of vegetative cover in Maples Branch—also where cattle were allowed access to water—were resulting in heavy sediment loads downstream in Abrams Creek. In 1993, the Park Service, with the help of volunteers from Trout Unlimited, began fencing stream banks and limiting cattle access to a small number of crossings.
About the same time, a UT graduate student began an in-depth baseline study of aquatic insects along the length of Abrams Creek. For two years, Stephen Fraley, in a cooperative agreement with UT and the National Park Service, compiled an exhaustive inventory of the creek’s macroinverterbrate richness and community structure. Fraley evaluated the abundance and variety of aquatic insects as an indicator of overall stream health.
Fraley sampled seven sites scattered throughout the 88 square miles of the watershed and found 340 taxa from 90 families. “We took massive amounts of qualitative samples, tens of thousands of organisms,” says Fraley, who is now a non-game aquatic biologist with the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission in western North Carolina.
Though the overall condition of the creek was very good to excellent, Fraley found evidence of effects from streambank erosion, nutrient enrichment, and lack of habitat diversity. This study lent support to the Park Service’s plans to exclude cattle from the creek, build and repair fences along the streams, contain eroded streambanks, and reseed with native grasses.
In 1999, the cattle were removed when the last leaseholder in Cades Cove, Kermit Caughron, died. Since the streambank improvements and removal of the cattle, turbidity, which is measured by collecting stream samples after big storm events, has dropped dramatically.
"Abrams Creek naturally carries more sediment than other streams because it is in an alluvial plain, and it meanders and cuts the banks more than other streams,” says Steve Moore, fisheries biologist with the Park. “When the cows were fenced off away from the streambanks, all the real fine mud, the fine sediment, washed out. Since they have been removed, the amount of sediment is close to natural,” Moore says.
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For more information Contact Bob Miller, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, 107 Park Headquarters Road, Gatlinburg, TN 37738, or call 865-436-1207.
With the help of UT researchers, planners in Tennessee are learning to envision alternative scenarios to traditional growth patterns.
By Elise LeQuire
IN HOPES OF IMPROVING COMMUNICATION and coordination between land-use and transportation planners, researchers at the University of Tennessee’s (UT) Energy, Environment and Resources Center (EERC) recently submitted a report to state and regional agencies responsible for long-term planning.
The report, “Linking Transportation Planning and Land Use Planning,” helps connect the dots between the two sectors. Concerns about air quality were a driving force behind the report, says Mary English, EERC research leader and lead author of the report, which was completed in July 2003. The report focuses on a five-county pilot area in the Nashville metropolitan region. The area includes Davidson, Rutherford, Sumner, Williamson, and Wilson counties.
The 1970 Clean Air Act Amendments recognized that on-road vehicle emissions and land-use patterns are intricately linked and suggested that land-use controls be used to help states attain reductions in emissions, the report says. The Act did not, however, specify how such controls could be used to achieve airquality objectives.
Though the federal government can withhold transportation funds for road projects in areas that are not in compliance with air-quality standards, it’s up to state and local planners to find ways to mitigate air pollution.
In Tennessee, the power to regulate land use is vested in local and municipal planning organizations, while counties are required by Tennessee’s Growth Policy Act of 1998 to prepare growth plans using 20-year population projections. However, the state’s transportation department has jurisdiction over state and regional transportation planning.
The report provides a checklist to help planners get on the same page in the planning process. “Planners need to develop a common language and use common metrics when planning for transportation and land use,” English says.
In addition, transportation and landuse planners need to synchronize the time frames they use in long-range planning, use similar population and employment forecasts, and utilize the same base data to generate their forecasts and determine a plan of action. To that end, the report recommends that planners adopt an existing computer modeling tool currently used in Florida to forecast land-use and transportation patterns and assist planners in the decision-making process.
The project is the offshoot of a policy academy held in July and October 2002 by the National Governor’s Association and was first proposed by former Governor Don Sundquist and former Deputy Govenor for Policy Justin Wilson. Tennessee was one of six states that participated in the academy, which was sponsored by the Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT), the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, the Tennessee Advisory Commission on Intergovernmental Relations, the Greater Nashville Regional Council, and the Nashville Metropolitan Planning Commission.
Forecasting the Future
Most metropolitan planning organizations of significant size do try to predict
future transportation trends, says Jerry Everett, research director of UT’s
Center for Transportation Research and a contributor to the report. “Travel-demand
forecast modeling uses a series of mathematical relationships to predict the
amount of travel on a highway network in future years,” Everett says.
In Tennessee, however, there is no comparable model being used for land-use
planning.
“In transportation planning, the assumption is that land use doesn’t change,” Everett says. With current forecasting models, if you put in a major new freeway, for example, there is no way to determine how that would change landuse patterns. “The project panel asked us to look at the feasibility of finding a comprehensive, integrated model that could be used in the state,” he says.
Their research led them to the Urban Landuse Allocation Model (ULAM) developed by Mike Brown, president of Transportation Planning Services Inc. and a professor of Urban and Transportation Planning at the University of Florida in Gainesville. ULAM has been adopted throughout the state of Florida to help predict how changes in transportation affect land-use patterns—and vice versa. “Land-use planners can review the impacts of large-scale development, for example a regional mall, in one area and see how that will change patterns elsewhere,” Brown says.
ULAM can also model the effects of siting new schools, installing water and sewer lines, or developing a new subdivision on vacant land. “ULAM can help planners alleviate congestion, reduce the number of vehicle miles traveled, and as a result, improve air quality,” Brown says.
TDOT is considering ULAM as part of a pilot research project in the Nashville metropolitan area to explore the relationship between land use and transportation planning.
New Paradigms
Vehicle miles traveled in Tennessee increased more than 30 percent between 1992
and 2000, and traffic is predicted to grow steadily for the foreseeable future.
A mix of local, state, and federal initiatives, voluntary or regulatory, will
be needed to counter the rise in vehicle emissions. “With new technologies,
older cars today are a lot cleaner than in the past,” says Ed Cole, chief
of TDOT’s newly formed Bureau of Environment and Conservation. “There
will come a time when we have gotten as far as we can in terms of cleaning up
vehicle emissions,” Cole says.
To date, however, the state of Tennessee has lagged behind other states in its commitment to alternative modes of transportation. According to a July 2003 report by the state comptroller’s office, in the past decade, Tennessee has used little more than 60 percent of federal funds available for congestion mitigation and transportation enhancement while spending nearly all available National Highway System funds for road building.
Those figures could change, however, as TDOT is currently developing a comprehensive transportation plan for the state for the next 25 years that will consider alternatives to the road-building paradigm. “We won’t see dramatic improvements until we make some major investments in mass transit and alternative forms of transportation,” Cole says.
Public education and voluntary actions can also be powerful tools for change at the local and regional level. For example, when a metropolitan region forecasts high ozone potential, people can be advised to postpone trips or delay mowing their yards. “Human beings have a real capacity to respond to need if there is clear communication and people trust the source,” Cole says.
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For more informaiton contact Mary English, EERC, the University of Tennessee, 311 Conference Center Building, Knoxville, TN 37996-4134, or call 865-974-3825.
EDUCATION.
In July, EERC’s senior scientist in sustainable development, Don Huisingh,
led a course for educators at the UT Conference Center. The five-day “Toward
a Sustainable Future” seminar attracted participants from colleges and
universities across the country. Joining Huisingh on the faculty were David
Feldman (Political Science), Michael McKinney (Geological Science), and other
noted sustainability experts, such as David Orr of Oberlin College (Ohio). The
course demonstrated how instructors can incorporate principles and tools of
sustainable development into curricula across higher education.
PRESENTATIONS. Ruth Anne Hanahan, a research
associate with EERC’s Water Resources Research Center, along with Caitlin
Cottrill (graduate research assistant, Planning), have been conducting a study
comparing three southeastern statewide volunteer monitoring programs, including
Alabama Water Watch, Georgia Adopt-A-Stream, and Kentucky Water Watch. They
recently presented interim findings at the Alabama Water Watch Association’s
10th Annual Meeting in Auburn, Alabama. On behalf of the U.S. Department of
State Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs’ International Visitor
Program, Ruth Anne Hanahan recently gave a presentation on Adopt-a-Watershed
and environmental education to African Regional Project delegates. The project,
which explored U.S. sustainable development efforts, is designed to promote
greater understanding and cooperation between the United States and African
countries on matters of environment, health, and economic development.
WORKSHOPS. EERC’s East Tennessee Clean Fuels Coalition (ETCFC), along with the National Biodiesel Board, the Tennessee Soybean Promotion Board, and the U.S. Department of Energy Region Four Clean Cities Program, sponsored the June 2003 Biodiesel Workshop at the Knoxville Convention Center. Jonathan Overly, EERC research associate and coordinator of ETCFC, welcomed participants from Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, and Kentucky and gave an overview of the Coalition’s goals and Tennessee’s use of alternative fuels. Overly also presented data on nitrogen-oxides emissions reductions, and highlighted biodiesel use in the National Park system. Other presentations included success stories from across the nation and Tennessee, overview of soybeans and biodiesel, and production and other issues surrounding biodiesel fuel.
PUBLICATIONS. EERC Research Leader Mary English, along with doctoral student Sean Huss (Sociology), coauthored a book chapter on “Population and Urbanization,” which will appear in A Land Imperiled: The Declining Health of the Southern Appalachian Bioregion (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 2004).
