Could Fire Beat Water?
By Vishva Nalamalapu, Office of the Chancellor
Water suppresses fire, but fire may also suppress clean drinking water. Worsening wildfires could contaminate water with burnt materials, soil, and nutrients. This is especially concerning for communities in western Washington and Oregon, where millions of people rely on surface water for drinking water.
Julie Padowski, a research associate professor in the School of the Environment at WSU Pullman, is uncovering how wildfires are impacting drinking water in the Pacific Northwest through two complementary studies. Her team is not only advancing the science; they are developing tools that communities can use to protect their drinking water from wildfires.
In one NASA-funded study, researchers from the University of Idaho, the University of Nevada at Reno, Oregon State University, the U.S. Forest Service, and Washington State University are developing a model to predict how wildfires could affect water quality and working to translate that into a tool water utility managers can use to improve their wildfire preparedness and response. Among them is Abdisa Kebebew, a master’s student at WSU Pullman. He’s working on part of the model that will better predict reservoir water quality changes after wildfires. The team will work with land managers and water utilities to identify what could help maintain water quality during and after fires.
Padowski will help take the models one step further. “I’m the researcher that helps connect the science to the practice,” she says. She is working with her modeling team and water utility managers to develop a tool that water utilities will be able to use to identify where they should prioritize management to maintain good water quality. That could look like preventing wildfires by making firebreaks and thinning forests or responding to the impacts of wildfires when they do occur by changing infrastructure or finding alternative water sources.
The second study, funded by the U.S. Forest Service, is led out of Oregon State University. The project includes four research team, each focusing on a different component of how wildfires impact drinking water in Oregon and Washington, from modelling and collecting field data to studying risks for water utilities and the socioeconomic impacts.
Padowski is focused on who manages the land the surface water is coming from and how those managers could improve their responses to wildfires. Jacob Bernal, a master’s student at WSU Pullman, is also part of the team. He’s especially interested in how different managers work together. He wants to help communities take a more coordinated management approach, which requires collaboration. “It all really starts out with relationship building and building these connections with one another,” he says.
Padowski is also leading an integration group that’s composed of members from each team. They ensure everyone’s work is helping the others and synthesize all the results. It’s challenging to develop a common understanding amongst people in such diverse disciplines. “You could be using the same word, and it means a really different thing when you’re coming at it from an economic perspective versus a biophysical perspective,” says Padowski.
For all its challenges, interdisciplinary research is the best way to solve the inherently interdisciplinary problems that communities face. Even more so when it takes place at WSU. As a land-grant university, WSU is all about research that directly supports communities. “Working at WSU really gives us an edge up on being able to do work that is meaningful both on the ground and to our academic disciplines,” says Padowski.