The Flint water crisis demonstrated that citizens around the country may be unaware of potential environmental threats that can impact their quality of life. For example, although the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulates all community water systems in the United States, information on local water testing and results is difficult to locate. Community water suppliers only have to provide this information to the public once a year in an annual report, often called a Consumer Confidence Report. Information on air and soil contaminants is equally difficult to find. An open data, citizen science initiative can reduce these barriers and empower citizens around the country through easier access to this critical information.
Citizen science programs can serve as major data sources for scientific research, and can be particularly valuable in collecting timely, local data. Citizen scientists make it possible to collect large amounts of data and move large-scale research projects forward cost-effectively. On a local level, these projects engage and inform citizens as well.
The EPA should develop a centralized, coordinated national program, a National Data EnviroCorps, that provides a framework for citizen volunteers to test their water, air, and soil, and then contribute their data to an online EPA platform that hosts environmental quality data from around the country. The Federal Crowdsourcing and Citizen Science Toolkit can serve as a model for this work, laying out the steps to a successful citizen science project. In addition to providing nationwide data for EPA analysis, the EnviroCorps would enable citizens to assess environmental risks and identify local problems in their neighborhoods. The EPA can also use this data directly to identify areas that require additional EPA attention, including formal sampling and official measurements that may contribute to regulatory action.
The EPA can maximize the benefit of this program by developing standards for data collection, using a feedback/verification method to validate data as other citizen science programs have done, and encouraging students to become EnviroCorps citizen scientists. EPA can also help citizen scientists find information about available sensors, testing methods, and standards and understand technical issues, calibration/validation parameters, and quality assurance/quality control. EnviroCorps scientists can buy their own water/air/soil testing kits, and local school districts can incorporate testing (including test kit provisions) in middle school science programs.
Air Quality Egg, a Kickstarter-funded initiative that started in 2012, has proven this concept by connecting more than 2,500 citizen scientists testing air quality around the world. Similarly, NoiseTube enables citizens to monitor noise pollution using their smartphones and makes the data centrally available for the public.
Several citizen science initiatives across the country currently play a similar role at a local level. Florida LAKEWATCH, for example, has enlisted thousands of volunteers to collect reliable long-term water quality data for over 1,100 lakes, 175 coastal sites, 120 rivers, and 5 springs across 57 Florida counties; the state uses the data to address lake management issues statewide. EPA’s own volunteer monitoring programs for non-point source water pollution also provide elements that could be useful for helping to build a broader effort.
These citizens science initiatives have demonstrated that citizen monitoring and data gathering can serve as a powerful source for informing communities. The National Data EnviroCorps brings this idea to a national scale and tackles a critical challenge facing American communities.