WJU gets EPA grant to test coalfield environmental concerns

The university is working on projects such as the Coal Impoundment Web site to make Appalachian mining communities safer.

Wheeling Jesuit University is receiving a federal CARE grant, or Community Action for a Renewed Environment, for more than $269,000.

This is the second CARE grant awarded to WJU. The first one allowed the university to conduct an assessment of Southern West Virginia communities which helped local groups identify 140 environmental concerns.

Researcher and Biology Professor Ben Stout said the number one concern for residents is safe drinking water.

“Drinking water is definitely the top concern and top priority because it is such a critical issue to those communities and their health. It is a big concern because we have what could be the best water supply anywhere in the world and it is gradually eroding and becoming one of the worst water supplies in the world.”

The environmental testing and research is focusing on six Southern West Virginia areas: Mud River, Prenter, Cabin Creek, Anstead, Logan and Varney.

Wheeling Jesuit has been studying the impacts of mining and coal slurry on communities for the past eight years.

According to Davitt McAteer, CEO of Wheeling Jesuit University's Center for Educational Technologies and the National Technology Transfer Center at WJU, the grant gives people the power to address environmental issues at a local level.

“If it is determined that the water quality has deteriorated in a particular community, a number of steps can be taken. One is testing; the second is developing an alternative to that water system to provide water immediately for a clean healthy water source and to look at the science of how we might mitigate the damage that is going on.

"So the notion is to get the community involved for renewed environmental protection and bring the science to bear to achieve that,” said McAteer.

The Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston is also helping fund environmental research in the Southern region. The goal of the project is to bring together communities and experts in the field.

“We will hire a community organizer to bring people out, hear their concerns and prioritize them. We will do investigations, sample people’s water supplies and bring in science advisors from surrounding universities, Marshall, Virginia Tech, WVU and Eastern Kentucky University.

"We are also going to host a scientific conference that will bring together everybody at every university in the region that is conducting some type of environmental research,” said Stout.

The environmental science conference is being planned for next summer.

The research project will take place over the next two years.