Lunch with Carol: Microplastics in Riverine Systems

Watershed 101:

Lunch with Carol -Microplastics in Riverine Systems

July 22, 2020 

12:00 pm - 1:00 pm

webinar 

Please help us keep events like this free. Donations are appreciated but not required.

Plastics are commonplace in and around our waters of Pennsylvania, in our soils, and in the air, and understanding their affects on our environments and on life is urgent.  This science is still in its infancy and questions are basic such as how plastics are being dumped and leaked daily, which biological systems can microplastics affect with how much damage, and what are the effects on biota of the contaminants in plastics.  Policies are not yet developed in any country for microplastics, or on effects in riverine systems.  The current methods to dispose of plastic waste are far from being circularized in the economy.  More information is needed on effectiveness of efforts to reduce plastic waste, how to change human behavior and responses to policies, how industry can be drawn in with incentives/disincentives, and on how to assess the consequences of plastic waste.  This webinar will focus on studies and policies on riverine systems, and will include available studies of Pennsylvania streams.

Carol Armstrong is a cognitive neuroscientist and neuropsychologist who shifted her focus to watershed restoration after 35 years of research on radiotherapy effects on the brain and caring for people with brain cancer and other neurological and psychiatric illnesses at the University of Pennsylvania Medical School and the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.  She is a member of the Friends of Heinz Refuge Board, PennState Ext. Master Watershed Steward for Chester and Delaware Counties, the Stroud Water Research Center's stream monitoring program, vice-chair of Charlestown Township Environmental Advisory Committee, and Advisory Council of the Pennsylvania Office of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation.