Adopt a Water Quality Monitoring Site

Adopt-a-Site puts the power of water quality monitoring back into our communities.

Potomac Riverkeeper Network’s Community Science Water Quality Monitoring is our most underfunded program, and in the wake of the Potomac Interceptor sewage spill, the need to provide independent, scientifically-rigorous water quality data is more important now than ever before. Our data, published every week on our social media channels and on SwimGuide, helps families make informed recreation decisions each weekend all summer, and scientists can track patterns and anomalies that help us understand the health of the river and hold polluters accountable.

Your gift of $2,500 will sponsor one site for the full WQM season, ensuring that we can collect, analyze and publish e.Coli data weekly from May - October at 30 popular recreation sites in the central Potomac. We welcome community groups or individuals to come together to sponsor their favorite site at the full or partial amount. Your donation will go towards supporting your favorite WQM site in the following ways: 
 • Recruitment, training and management for 2-3 volunteers that collect weekly samples at your site all season
 • Lab maintenance and equipment, collection supplies, and scientific expertise to analyze samples from your site in our own labs in National Harbor, MD or Colonial Beach, VA
 • Publishing data from your site every Friday so that you know when and where it is safe to recreate on the river
 • Where possible, expanded emergency testing at new sites, with increased frequency, and for new toxins near the Potomac Interceptor rupture site to understand sewage spill impacts and hold authorities accountable.