A collaborative effort was started, in late 2004, between officials of the local wastewater treatment plant in Greenville, N.C., and researchers from the Health Education and Promotion Department/Environmental Health and Safety Program at East Carolina University. Greenville is one of the cities through which the Tar River crosses. This river not only serves as the main source of drinking water for this city with an estimated population of more than 70,000, but it also serves as a receiver of treated effluent from the wastewater treatment plant. Along with other rivers in Eastern North Carolina, the Tar River was classified, in 1989, as nutrient-sensitive, which originated the adoption of a nutrient management strategy. This strategy was revised in the early 1990s to target a reduction in the total nitrogen load and to control increase of the total phosphorus load. Efforts made to address this problem have ranged from technological upgrades implemented by wastewater treatment plants that discharged treated effluents into the river to studies in collaboration with North Carolina research institutions designed to enhance nutrient-removal processes.

This collaboration between an East Carolina University research group and the local wastewater treatment plant is expected to grow and be provided with the necessary continuity to make it sustainable. The group of researchers, which included graduate and undergraduate students, has conducted a laboratory study with promising findings. They studied the uptake of nutrients by growing algae in effluents from different stages of the wastewater treatment process and by creating favorable environmental conditions. Data analyses are being conducted to prepare manuscripts for publication. Other proposals will be presented to local wastewater treatment plant officials to continue addressing the nutrient-removal challenge.

Primarily, this is a public health effort aimed at benefiting not only the parties involved, but also other stakeholders. By building bridges of collaboration among stakeholders, especially in a region of North Carolina that is economically disadvantaged in relation to the Research Triangle Park, the ultimate beneficiaries will be local and regional communities, and the future environmental health leaders in Eastern NC who might expand their horizons.

To learn more about this effort please contact Max A. Zarate, assistant professor of environmental health at East Carolina University’s Health Education and Promotion Department.