NC Collaboratory funds critical environmental research
Check out three projects on water quality, lithium mining and marsh restoration that are protecting the state and its residents.
Housed at UNC-Chapel Hill, the North Carolina Collaboratory has a mission to serve the state by solving North Carolina’s most pressing challenges through collaboration at the university level.
The Collaboratory, created in 2016 by the North Carolina General Assembly, facilitates the dissemination of policy and research expertise for the UNC System and other universities across the state.
Check out three examples of Collaboratory-funded environmental work conducted by Carolina researchers.
NC Pure
What: Part of the Collaboratory’s wider PFAS Testing Network, NC Pure is working to make North Carolina’s drinking water safer by creating innovative and economical ways to remove PFAS, the harmful “forever” chemicals, from water sources.
Carolina engineers and chemists have devised reusable novel sorbents that absorb PFAS and remove them from water. The Collaboratory’s investment in the work helps scale up testing.
Who: The project co-leads are Frank Leibfarth, associate professor of chemistry in the UNC College of Arts and Sciences, and Orlando Coronell, professor in the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health’s environmental sciences and engineering department.
Where: The project has a lab in Morrisville and is conducting testing performance at three water treatment plants across North Carolina.
They said it: “We’ve set up a structure at NC Pure where all the chemists and engineers working on this are in the same building under the same roof, talking constantly. That has allowed us to speed up development and narrow down on formulations that work well very quickly. The goal is for our technology to remove PFAS from people’s water at a lower cost.” — Frank Leibfarth
Video by Jeyhoun Allebaugh/University Development
Developing clean energy: the impact of research on lithium mining
What: Drew Coleman and his team want to make lithium mining in North Carolina more precise and efficient. They’re doing that by determining the age of lithium-bearing rocks through laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy. This knowledge of regional age patterns is useful for determining where else to look for lithium.
A component of lithium-ion batteries, lithium is a key resource in clean energy, with applications in electric vehicles and energy storage. Large lithium deposits have been found in the state’s tin-spodumene belt.
Who: Coleman, professor in the UNC College of Arts and Sciences’ Earth, marine and environmental sciences department.
Where: The tin-spodumene belt is located west of Charlotte from Kings Mountain to Lincolnton.
They said it: “This offers an opportunity to the state of North Carolina to be a real leader in clean energy for the country.” — Drew Coleman
Drew Coleman (Jon Gardiner/UNC-Chapel Hill)
Mapping marshes with drones
What: In collaboration with Elizabeth City State University, researchers from the Carolina Drone Lab are taking to the skies to understand the status of marshes along the Currituck Sound in northeastern North Carolina and help restore sites that are crucial to flood reduction and erosion prevention.
An improvement upon satellite imagery, the thousands of super-high resolution drone-generated images provide centimeter accuracy of marshes. The precision is useful for tracking the trajectories of marsh erosion and movement. Other GPS-verified data monitors whether a marsh is keeping up with sea-level rise, which is possible through sediment accretion.
Who: Susan Cohen is Carolina Drone Lab’s director, Troy Walton is a senior research associate, and master’s candidate Peggy Mullin is a research technician.
Where: The research takes place at the Pine Island Audobon Sanctuary in Corolla, which preserves 2,600 acres of marsh, maritime forest and beaches.
They said it: “This research benefits the citizens of North Carolina because the marsh problem is not just localized to Currituck Sound. It is across North Carolina and the world. If we can better understand what’s happening here, then we’re able to take these strategies and expand them to the state and then hopefully further beyond that as well.” — Troy Walton
Video by /UNC Research
