The National Association of Wetland Managers (NAWM) holds eight webinars per year for members. NAWM Member webinars cover a variety of topics encompassing wetland science, policy, program implementation, and legal issues. These webinars, including recordings for past webinars are available to NAWM members.
Not a NAWM Member? Join or Renew
For more information about this webinar series, please contact Laura Burchill at laura@nawm.org or
(207) 892-3399. Learn more about sponsorship opportunities.
If you haven’t used Go To Webinar before or you just need a refresher, please view our guide prior to the webinar.
View Past NAWM Members' Webinar Series Here
View a List of Past NAWM Members' Webinar Series Recordings Here
Please note, updated webinar title.
Spatially explicit estimation of wetland nutrient inputs and their relationship with water quality
Wednesday, September 24, 2025 - 3:00-4:00 p.m. EDT
PRESENTER
- Scott Alford, ORISE / US EPA Office of Research and Development
ABSTRACT
Wetlands are effective in reducing nutrient loads in surface waters, but there is a need to optimize allocation of conservation efforts to efficiently maximize the likelihood of water quality improvements. This presentation describes efforts to quantify nutrients flowing through wetlands and identify existing and potential wetlands that maximize attenuation of excess landscape nutrients across the conterminous United States (CONUS). We then combined our datasets with harmonized national water quality data to model regional and seasonal variability in the relationship between wetland nutrient interception and in-stream nitrate across CONUS. We found that there was a consistent negative relationship between in-stream nitrate concentrations and wetland interception of landscape nutrients in the Upper Midwest, Temperate Plains, and SE Coastal Plains regions of the US with strongest relationships during Spring, illustrating the role of wetlands in reducing landscape nitrogen transport to streams. Drier regions of the western US exhibited either neutral or positive relationships of wetland interception and stream nitrate, depending on the season, indicating that wetlands may accumulate and then serve as a stream nitrate source in these regions under certain conditions. We are currently developing methods to apply these relationships to potential wetland areas across CONUS to estimate potential improvement of water quality through wetland restoration. These analyses and data will provide an optimized CONUS-wide wetland conservation framework to aid local communities better tailor their nutrient reduction strategies.
BIO
Scott is an ORISE postdoctoral fellow with the US EPA’s ORD Freshwater Ecology Branch in Corvallis, Oregon under the mentorship of Dr. Ryan Hill. Scott holds a PhD in Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences from the University of Florida and has a background in estuarine ecology. Scott’s ORISE project focuses on using spatial analyses to quantify nutrient interception by wetlands across CONUS.
A Certificate of Attendance to be used toward Continuing Education Credits is available when participating in NAWM's live webinars. All Certificates must be claimed no later than 60 days from the live presentation. Certificates are not available for viewing recorded webinars. More Information.
To view Past Members' Wetland Webinars:
Members You must be logged in.
Nonmembers To view recent Members' Webinars, please join NAWM.
View Past Member' Webinar Series Here
View a List of Past Members' Webinar Series Recordings Here