PHOENIX (July 20, 2021) – The Arizona Department of Environmental Quality (ADEQ), the state’s cabinet-level environmental agency that administers environmental laws as well as programs, today announced that its Automated Surface Water Quality Assessment Tool received a Top Product of the Year Award. The category is the elite Environment + Energy Leader Awards 2021 program. The win is also an indication that the program’s expert judges consider ADEQ’s automated assessment tool. This is a top example of the exemplary work being done today in the field of environmental management.
ADEQ developed the Automated Surface Water Quality Assessment Tool. It helps to determine Clean Water Act assessment decisions at the parameter, use in addition to waterbody levels. The tool automates every step. It goes from gathering national water quality portal data to creating a final assessment report for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Subsequently, with the tool’s extreme automation, ADEQ can efficiently and effectively determine if lakes and streams meet federal water quality standards. They then can make timely decisions that address the most pressing issues impairing Arizona’s surface waters.
Automated Surface Water Quality Assessment Tool
“The Automated Surface Water Quality Assessment Tool slashed the time to conduct a statewide surface water quality assessment of over 1,400 waters by more than 99 percent — what took nine months of staff time now takes roughly 15 minutes and saves more than $500,000 annually.” said ADEQ Water Quality Division Director Trevor Baggiore. “This tool allows us to view the status of our waters on a much more frequent basis.”
One judge said of ADEQ’s new tool, “The open source approach means that in addition to the citizens of Arizona benefitting from improved health of lakes and streams. Other communities can adopt the practice as well.”
Another judge added, “Decreased labor hours and increased insight into water quality and the effectiveness of remediation efforts is commendable.”
The Environment + Energy Leader Awards is a program recognizing excellence in products and services that provide companies with energy and environmental benefits. It also recognizes projects implemented by organizations that improved environmental or energy management and increased the bottom line.
“With a very experienced and critical judging panel and a strict set of judging criteria, entrants faced an extremely high bar to qualify for an award in 2021” says Sarah Roberts. Roberts is the Environment + Energy Leader publisher.
View the open source, free and shareable ADEQ Automated Surface Water Quality Assessment dashboard: https://azdeq.shinyapps.io/assessment_dashboard/.
Contact | ADEQ Public Information Officer
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About the Environment + Energy Leader Awards
For nearly a decade, the Environment + Energy Leader Awards have celebrated excellence in the world of environmental, sustainability and energy management. Award winners are truly buzz-worthy. The best companies sport Top Product of the Year Award badges. When other companies are seeking a sustainability or energy management solution, they know that E+E Product of the Year Award winners offer a significant group of products, vetted by experts, to peruse for help in making their decisions. Project of the Year Award winners are known to illustrate how sustainability and energy management projects. They can successfully help other companies improve the bottom line.