World Water Day 2024, Friday March 22
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The Elmvale Foundation celebrated World Water Day (on Friday March 22), with a book launch! The book is entitled The Elmvale Groundwater Observatory: A Facility Developed to Sample Pristine, Artesian Groundwaters for Trace Elements and was written with my coauthors Beatriz Bicalho, Chad Cuss, Iain Grant-Weaver, Muhammad Babar Javed, Michael Krachler, Tommy Noernberg, Michael Powell, Jiancheng (James) Zheng. The book is published by The Groundwater Project which is a Canadian charity led by Prof. John Cherry. All of the books published by The Groundwater Project (40 and counting) can be downloaded for free. There have been more than a quarter of a million downloads already, with readers in 17 countries. One thousand volunteers from 70 countries have translated these books into 47 languages. Download our book for free. Having tested the flowing artesian groundwaters of the Elmvale area for more than 30 years, the book summarizes the main research findings. While the focus is on trace elements and the importance of dedicated wells and contamination control, data is included on major ions, organic contaminants (none were detected), the estimated age of the water and a geological cross section where the wells are located. The launch included a reception and live presentation of the highlights of the book on the University of Alberta campus. It was an honour to host so many esteemed colleagues from the University of Alberta: Drs. Stan Blade (Dean of the Faculty of Agricultural, Life and Environmental Sciences), and Victor Adamowicz (Vice Dean) as well as Dr. Matina Kalcounis-Rueppell (Dean of the College of Natural and Applied Sciences, and Vice Provost). Also in attendance were Drs. John Zhou, Vice-President of Clean Resources, and Dr. Brett Purdy, Executive Director of Environmental Innovation at Alberta Innovates. The soil science community was well represented, with Drs. Anne Naeth (Director of the Land Reclamation International Graduate School), along with David Chanasyk, Scott Chang, Miles Dyck, and Tariq Siddique. Pieter de Vos attended to represent the Bocock family. |
The presentation was available online, and it was great to see Kim Sturges, O.C. of WaterSMART, Prof. Gus Hill of Wilfred Laurier University and Erik Schomann of Seneca College, as well as friends and neighbours from Springwater and Tiny Townships, and Beausoleil First Nation, in addition to coauthors of the book and members of our groundwater study team.
The presentation plus the Q/A session were filmed, and the video is available here.
Special thanks to Fiorella Barraza, Andrii Oleksandrenko, Pamela Wescott, and Quincy Ybaňez for helping to plan and host the book launch, and to Andrii for filming the event and processing the video.
The Elmvale Foundation is a federally registered charity for environmental science and public education. If you are able to support our efforts, donations can be made online and are received with sincere gratitude.
Questions about the Elmvale Groundwater Observatory may be submitted to shotyk@ualberta.ca and enquiries about the Elmvale Foundation may be sent to bill@elmvale.org.
To address commonly asked questions about water quality, plain language updates will be posted on Instagram where I am @waterwasyl.
Please join me there for an exploration of the chemical evolution of our remarkable groundwater in relation to the periodic table of the elements. Our water contains every element under the sun, but their concentrations vary over 12 orders of magnitude!
William Shotyk, President, Elmvale Foundation
Bocock Chair for Agriculture and the Environment, Department of Renewable Resources,
University of Alberta