Great Lakes research

The UB Great Lakes Program (GLP) has simulated Lake Ontario over the past decade, which has led to a state-of-the-art water quality model–the Lake Ontario Toxics Model, version 2 (LOTOX2)–developed by Joseph DePinto, civil, structural and environmental engineering (CSEE) research professor with researchers at UB, Clarkson University, the National Water Research Institute in Canada, and the New York Great Lakes Research Consortium at SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry (ESF). Funding originated from the consortium and continued from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Currently, two projects are seeking to improve model performance by linking it with a hydrodynamic model to provide mixing and circulation information for transport calculations, and to extend the modeling capabilities by incorporating a sub-model to simulate mercury transport and transformations. Joseph Atkinson, GLP director and CSEE professor, James Jensen, CSEE associate professor and DePinto are heading these efforts with New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and EPA staff. The model estimates total maximum daily load for contaminants. The sub-model will evaluate the dangers that concentrations pose for human and ecosystem health.

Related modeling of Lake Ontario involves detailed hydrodynamic and temperature models. An Atkinson master’s student recently completed a comprehensive numerical model that evaluates the lake’s thermal cycle. It is being extended to provide fast response predictions of algal bloom transport in Lakes Ontario and Erie. The project, with Atkinson as PI, is part of a five-year study headed by Gregory Boyer at SUNY ESF, funded by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. This first harmful algal bloom study conducted in fresh waters represents a new direction in Great Lakes research.

Atkinson is also the U.S. lead for the Environmental Technical Working Group’s five-year International Joint Commission study to evaluate the water level regulation plans for outflows of Lake Ontario into the St. Lawrence River.