Grants and Contributions:

Grant or Award spanning more than one fiscal year. (2017-2018 to 2022-2023)

Our research team is working on making farming activities in central Canada more resilient under changing climatic conditions with the determination of beneficial/best management practices (BMPs) that can reduce non-point source (NPS) pollution from conventional and emerging contaminants.

Computer models are being developed that can simulate not only surface and subsurface hydrologic processes under changing climate but also evaluate BMPs for significantly reducing green house gas emissions as well as non-point chemical pollution on watershed scale. Efforts are also being made to evaluate on-farm use of biochar and super absorbent polymers and investigate their role in reducing environmental pollution from conventional and emerging contaminants. Given the worldwide growing scarcity of freshwater, efforts are also being made to use partially treated or untreated wastewater in agriculture and find ways of mitigating associated risks.

a) Development and Evaluation of Holisitic BMPs under Changing Climatic Conditions: There is an urgent need to determine BMPs for rural landscapes that can simultaneously reduce greenhouse gas emissions, sediment transport and agrichemical pollution. There are presently no credible methods or models of determining, a priori, which BMP would work best for reducing NPS pollution from a landscape in a holistic manner. Our Research Team has recently developed a new landscape model, called SWATDRAIN which can simulate surface and subsurface hydrology of tile-drained watersheds. We would continue to develop this model for determining BMPs for agricultural landscapes that can reduce GHG emissions and simultaneously minimize NPS pollution from conventional and emerging contaminants, add resiliency to agricultural activities under changing climatic conditions, and convey the much needed knowledge/information to agricultural producers and policy makers.

b) Safe wastewater use in agriculture: In order to reduce the total reliance of agriculture on freshwater, the use of wastewater is seen as a lasting solution. Farmers in developing countries are using wastewater, thereby polluting soil and produce directly and, the water bodies indirectly, with contaminants such as heavy metals, antibiotics, pesticides, hormones, and pathogenic bacteria.

We plan to study the fate and transport of inorganic and organic contaminants in soils irrigated with untreated wastewater in the presence of biochar and super absorbent polymers. More specifically, we will study the role of biochar from different feedstock in the immobilization of heavy metal (Cd, Cr, Cu, Fe, Pb and Zn) in soil. We will also include evaluation of the fate and transport of female estrogen-based hormones, namely estrone and estradiol, and progesterone in wastewater. Both aboveground (spinach) and underground (potatoes) crops will also be grown to investigate uptake of heavy metals and hormones.