Emily Lau, Author at Southern California Coastal Water Research Project

Articles by: Emily Lau

A field crew member from Heal the Bay collects a water sample from Santa Monica Bay as part of an ongoing, multi-agency water-quality monitoring initiative that SCCWRP is leading in the wake of the Palisades and Eaton fires. (Courtesy of Los Angeles County Fire Department Lifeguard Division)

SCCWRP coordinates post-fire aquatic monitoring network

in Emerging Contaminants, Regional Monitoring, Top News Comments are Disabled

SCCWRP has helped bring together more than two dozen organizations to form a water-quality monitoring network that is tracking how pollution and debris from the Palisades and Eaton fires are … More

A bioswale that runs along the side of a roadway in Orange County collects and treats stormwater runoff. SCCWRP has developed a scoring tool known as the Multi-Metric BMP Performance Index to quantify the performance of structural BMPs and provide insights into whether they are performing at levels that contribute to meeting watershed-specific water-quality goals.

Index scoring tool for rating BMP performance released

in Runoff Water Quality, Stormwater BMPs, Top News Comments are Disabled

SCCWRP has developed a scoring tool that quantifies the degree to which structural BMPs (best management practices) contribute to improving the health of downstream aquatic ecosystems – a novel method … More

A pteropod, or sea snail, with pit marks on its shell, shows signs of shell dissolution in response to ocean acidification. A stakeholder steering committee has begun working to prioritize recommendations developed as part of an independent review process of a suite of coastal ocean acidification and hypoxia modeling tools. (Courtesy of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration)

OAH modeling stakeholders helping SCCWRP prioritize expert panel’s recommendations

in Climate Change, Ocean Acidification and Hypoxia, Top News Comments are Disabled

A stakeholder steering committee that oversaw an independent expert review of a suite of coastal ocean acidification and hypoxia (OAH) modeling tools has begun deliberating about how best to implement … More

Tiny sea snails known as pteropods, which are collected using a plankton tow net, have provided some of the earliest signs of the ecological effects of ocean acidification and hypoxia in California coastal waters. Scientific experts have developed a West Coast plan for using environmental DNA from shell-forming organisms such as pteropods to track the ecological effects of ocean acidification.

Workshop examines how to use eDNA-based method to monitor OA’s biological effects

in Bioassessment, Climate Change, DNA Barcoding, Ocean Acidification and Hypoxia, Top News Comments are Disabled

A group of 15 scientific experts has developed a coordinated West Coast plan for using environmental DNA (eDNA) to track the effects of ocean acidification (OA) on vulnerable shell-forming organisms … More

Effort underway to coordinate SAV assessments along West Coast

in Bioassessment, Regional Monitoring, Southern California Bight Regional Monitoring Program Comments are Disabled

SCCWRP has begun coordinating with a network of West Coast monitoring agencies to build their capacity to assess the health of eelgrass beds and other submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) – … More

Prototype dashboard built to help identify ecologically healthy streams to protect

in Bioassessment, Indices of Biotic Integrity Comments are Disabled

SCCWRP has developed an initial prototype of a public facing data dashboard designed to help watershed managers statewide visualize and determine which streams that are ecologically healthy should be priorities … More

Technical foundation built for California to evaluate cannabis growers’ requests for stream flow diversions

in Ecohydrology Comments are Disabled

SCCWRP and its partners have developed a standardized assessment framework that enables California to assess whether the water that cannabis growers are requesting to divert from nearby streams to support … More

Microplastics collection method transferred to end users during pair of workshops

in Emerging Contaminants, Trash Pollution Comments are Disabled

SCCWRP and its partners have begun the process of transferring to end users a newly standardized method for collecting samples from drinking water treatment plants in preparation for measuring their … More

Study surveying fish consumption at urban lakes in L.A. region completed

in Emerging Contaminants, Sediment Quality Comments are Disabled

SCCWRP has completed a year-long study intended to help managers decide if one or more urban lakes in the Los Angeles region should receive a regulatory designation known as a … More

Passive samplers retrieved from offshore DDT barrels dump site

in Emerging Contaminants, Sediment Quality Comments are Disabled

SCCWRP and its partners at Scripps Institution of Oceanography have successfully retrieved passive samplers that were deployed for six months to measure sediment contamination at a former industrial waste dump … More