Scientists Cherilyn Mertes and Karen Béchard
–
Join us for an introduction to the world of phytoremediation, where trees, plants and microbes can power the clean-up of contaminated soil and water by absorbing, trapping or transforming pollutants. Cherilyn Mertes and Karen Béchard will provide an overview of the science behind how it works, a couple of real-world examples, and explore how we can harness the power of plants to remediate contaminated sites and create a greener future.
Cherilyn Mertes is an environmental scientist with 20 years of experience remediating groundwater at contaminated sites in Canada and the US, including using trees to cleanup heavily contaminated groundwater.
Karen Béchard is a Scientist with 18 years of experience managing projects, completing risk assessments for contaminated sites (for which she is a qualified professional [QPRA] in Ontario) and supporting their remediation.
Above photo: Laura Blanchard from Philadelphia, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0