Acid Mine Drainage and Precipitates

In this video, environmental scientists measure the pH of water to detect acid mine drainage from an abandoned coal mine and then demonstrate how metals present in acid drainage fall out of solution as precipitates when a basic substance is added to the water.

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Controlling Water Run-off

This video shows how the environmentally friendly design of the Visitor Center at Bernheim Arboretum and Research Forest near Louisville slows down water run-off and helps to control non-point-source water pollution, conserve water, and prevent soil erosion

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Environmental Impact of Acid Mine Drainage

This video shows how acid mine drainage from an abandoned coal mine has affected Wildcat Branch in Kentucky's Daniel Boone National Forest. Because the creek has a very acidic pH of 2.9, most organisms cannot survive there, and Wildcat Branch is essentially dead.

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Reusing Wastewater

This video demonstrates how peat filtration beds at Bernheim Arboretum and Research Forest near Louisville, Kentucky purify and conserve wastewater and eliminate one cause of non-point-source water pollution.

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The Geology of Coal

In this video, a geologist describes how coal, a sedimentary rock, was formed when organic materials piled up in swamps millions of years ago. Over time, heat and pressure transformed the buried materials into forms of coal that cause acid mine drainage when exposed to oxygen.

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Recycling and Restoration

This video explains how Bernheim Arboretum and Research Forest near Louisville, Kentucky used recycled cypress from pickle vats to build its visitor center and then “paid back” nature by creating a cypress-tupelo swamp at one end of a lake on the park grounds.

Tunneling for Water: Digging the Tunnel and Prehistoric Water!

This video traces the construction of Louisville Water Company’s riverbank filtration system, including the unexpected discovery of a reservoir of prehistoric water.

High-Sulfur Coal and Acidic Water

In this video, a geologist measures the pH of water after high-sulfur coal from a Kentucky coal mine has been added to it. This test demonstrates that the sulfate salts found on the coal’s surface cause the water to become much more acidic.

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Rain Gardens

This video shows how a rain garden at Bernheim Arboretum and Research Forest near Louisville, Kentucky slows down the flow of water from the forest’s parking lot and helps prevent soil erosion.

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Mycoremediation

This video explores the process of mycoremediation: planting fungi such as oyster mushrooms to mitigate non-point-source water pollution caused by oil, gasoline, and other toxic substances.

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Restoring Lower Rock Creek

This brief video describes how Lower Rock Creek’s location between two National Wild and Scenic Rivers caused Kentucky environmentalists to choose the creek as a target for acid mine drainage remediation.

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Acid Mine Drainage Remediation

In this video, an environmental technologist visits an abandoned coal mine in Kentucky to talk about how a remediation system (a series of settling ponds and treatment cells) is neutralizing the acid drainage flowing from the mine and keeping it from damaging a creek downstream.

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Applying the Scientific Method

This video provides a real-life example of the scientific method: testing hypotheses about which plants will grow most successfully on a green roof in Kentucky.

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Results of Acid Mine Drainage Remediation

In this video, a biologist visits Rock Creek in Pulaski County, Kentucky to show how acid mine drainage remediation has increased the stream’s pH from acidic levels to almost neutral. Although the ecosystem has not been completely restored, many species have returned to Rock Creek.

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Stream Restoration

This video explores how Bernheim Arboretum and Research Forest near Louisville, Kentucky has restored a channelized or straightened stream to its original meandering path, thereby improving the stream’s water quality and creating a better habitat for wildlife.

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Aquatic Insects

In this brief video, a biologist talks about the macroinvertebrates (typically aquatic insects) that form the basis of food webs in healthy Kentucky streams.

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Detached Wetlands

This video depicts a detached wetland, a small pool that forms beside a shallow meandering stream when it overflows its banks. These wetlands are important breeding grounds for the invertebrates that live in and beside streams

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Agricultural Runoff and the Gulf of Mexico Dead Zone

This video segment adapted from Big River: A King Corn Companion shows how agricultural chemicals from the Midwest that travel downstream in water runoff create a vast marine "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico.

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Atrazine Affects the Water Supply

In this video segment featuring live-action animation, adapted from Big River: A King Corn Companion, see how the agricultural pesticide atrazine impacts both crops and human health.

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Chicken Waste and Water Pollution

In this video segment adapted from FRONTLINE: “Poisoned Waters,” learn how unregulated waste from large-scale chicken farms contributes to water pollution.

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Climate Change Affects Glacial Water Source

Mountain glaciers are an important source of fresh water for the people of Peru. In this video segment produced by ThinkTV, learn how climate change is affecting the quantity and quality of available fresh water produced by glaciers in the Andes.

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Contaminating the Rockies

Learn how abandoned mines have been contaminating water supplies in the Rocky Mountains for decades in this video segment adapted from NOVA: "Poison in the Rockies."

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Kerri-Ann Richard

In this video from Science City, Kerri-Ann Richard, an environmental engineer, describes how she became interested in the field and why it is important to clean up the environment by removing contaminants from soil and ground water.

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Farm Nitrates in the Water Supply

Learn how nitrate runoff from farm fertilizers can negatively impact human health and how a water treatment plant is tackling the challenge, in this video excerpted from Big River.

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Farm Solutions to Water Pollution

In this KET video from Common Ground and Cleaner Water, Tribby Vice, a Kentucky farmer, talks about the changes he has made on his farm to protect the water quality of the stream running through his property and the watershed in which he lives.

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Fracking

In this video segment adapted from Need to Know, learn about the controversial method of extracting natural gas known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, and how some residents who live near drill sites are concerned that it's polluting their water.

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In Small Doses: Arsenic

In this video segment adapted from In Small Doses: Arsenic, learn how naturally occurring arsenic moves into groundwater and how much is too much for human consumption.

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La'ona DeWilde: Environmental Biologist

In this video profile produced for Teachers' Domain, meet La'ona DeWilde, an environmental biologist who integrates her Athabascan heritage and her Western scientific training to help remote Alaskan villages address environmental issues.

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New Contaminants in the Water Supply

In this video segment adapted from FRONTLINE: “Poisoned Waters,” hear about the challenges facing water treatment facilities and environmental regulators as they try to keep up with new chemicals found in the water supply.

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Oil Spill: Exxon Valdez, 1989

This video segment adapted from NOVA follows the clean-up effort after the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill off the coast of Alaska. Also featured is a marsh where an oil spill occurred 20 years earlier; analysis suggests that environmental damage may last for decades.

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Pollution Along the Rhine River

This video segment adapted from Race to Save the Planet discusses the effects of water pollution along the Rhine River and its impact on local wildlife.

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Safeguarding Alaska's Waters

In this interactive activity, learn about strategies used in Prince William Sound, Alaska, to help avoid oil spills and to identify and contain environmental contaminants. The activity features videos adapted from the Prince William Sound Regional Citizens' Advisory Council, KTOO, and NOVA: "The Big Spill".

Salmon Move into Deeper Waters

For generations, Native Americans have depended on their observations of nature for their survival. In this video segment adapted from Northwest Indian College, an Elder recalls how fishermen suspected the water was warming after observing salmon retreating to deeper waters.

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Unique Species of Kentucky's Green River

This KET video from Kentucky's Last Great Places shows how the Green River has remained unusually clean and why it is home to several endangered aquatic species.

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Urban Solutions to Water Pollution

In this KET video segment from Louisville Life, high school students in Louisville, Kentucky describe the benefits of creating rain gardens as a solution to non-point source water pollution.

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What Is a Watershed?

Large or small, urban or rural, most watersheds have certain attributes in common. This segment from KET’s Raindrops to Rivers uses animation to show the full scope of a watershed from its collection to its final destination.

Who Owns the Water of the Great Lakes?

In this video segment from Planet H₂0: Water World, experts and teens inside and outside the Great Lakes watershed provide different perspectives on sharing the water from one of the largest bodies of fresh water in the world.

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