2021 National Watershed & Stormwater Conference Highlights

On April 13^th through April 16^th, the Center for Watershed Protection hosted its sixth annual National Watershed & Stormwater Conference virtually. Our National Watershed & Stormwater Conferences are offered each Spring, and they provide a forum for sharing fresh ideas on the principles and practices of watershed and stormwater management.

For the second year in a row, the 2021 National Watershed & Stormwater Conference was held virtually to keep our attendees, presenters, sponsors, and staff safe and healthy. This year, we worked especially hard to create opportunities for the same interactive and engaging networking as the Center’s in-person events.

We would like to extend our sincerest thanks to everyone who made this year’s event yet another success:

• The members of our Technical Planning Committee, for volunteering their expertise and guiding the development of the conference’s technical content from beginning to end, for helping to raise awareness for the event, and for participating in the event as session moderators;
• All 70 of the speakers who crafted and delivered engaging, informative, and innovative presentations and/or workshops;
• The nearly 200 people who attended the virtual event;
• The 17 organizations who sponsored the event; and,
• The entire team at the Center for Watershed Protection who designed and facilitated the event.

Here are some highlights from the 2021 National Watershed & Stormwater Conference!

Who was there?

Nearly 200 attendees joined us virtually for this year’s National Watershed & Stormwater Conference. Virtual attendees signed on from all across North America, and there were even some international attendees this year as well. Attendees were affiliated with a wide variety of organizations: federal, state, and local government agencies, consulting firms, universities, and nonprofits—just to name a few.

What did we learn?

The 2021 National Watershed & Stormwater Conference was centered on a core of high-quality, interdisciplinary presentations and workshop sessions that highlighted practices, policies, and issues with land and water management throughout the United States. The presentations and workshops at the 2021 National Watershed & Stormwater Conference were organized into the following topic areas:

Protection & Restoration of Natural Lands

• Shoreline protection and restoration (living shorelines)
• Protection and restoration of wetlands and springs
• Stream restoration
• Integration of upland watershed management and coastal restoration/resiliency
• Mitigating and recovering from natural disasters
• Forest management and protection to improve water quality and manage quantity

Hydrology & Stormwater Management

• Innovations in stormwater management
• Integrating floodplain management and water quality restoration
• Connecting land-based watershed management and coastal resilience
• Green infrastructure and stormwater management
• Stormwater asset management: from design and construction to maintenance
• Stormwater management in karst environments
• Surface-groundwater connectivity. (e.g., impacts of septic tanks on spring- and groundwater quality and quantity)

Watershed Planning, Management, & Governance

• Connecting watershed management and economically important industries (such as tourism, eco-tourism, and agriculture)
• Contaminants of Emerging Concern (CECs): e.g., pharmaceuticals, PFAS, PCBs, PAHs, microplastics
• Watershed management in the context of COVID-19 recovery
• Integrating stormwater (MS4s), water, and wastewater management
• Innovative solutions to financing stormwater and watershed management
• Adaptive watershed management and innovative techniques
• Source water protection: from quantity to quality

Community Involvement

• Community education and involvement and environmental justice in watershed restoration
• Watershed management for community resiliency
• Integrating the perspectives and expertise of indigenous communities and NGOs in watershed management and protection
• Green jobs and workforce development efforts

Watershed Management Tools & Techniques

• Innovations in monitoring and modeling
• Remote sensing in watershed management (e.g., LiDAR)
• Uncertainty and non-stationarity in projecting the future: planning and design with resilience and sustainability in mind
• Water reuse technology

Also, since a priority for this year’s conference was creating ample opportunities for networking, we also incorporated themed networking sessions, each hosted by representatives of our sponsors, during lunchtime breaks and at the end of each day. Here’s a breakdown of the networking opportunities at this year’s event:

• In-Situ’s Tyler Hintz hosted a lunchtime networking break to discuss the common issues and solutions associated with remote monitoring.
• Ecotone’s Scott McGill hosted an afternoon networking session to discuss beaver management solutions.
• Wapro’s Gabe Lederman hosted an afternoon networking session to discuss the causes of flooding and its effects on sewer and stormwater systems.
• Watershed Consulting Associates’ Andres Torizzo hosted a lunchtime networking break to discuss innovations in public-private partnerships.
• Century Engineering’s Bob Bathurst hosted an afternoon networking session to discuss pay-for-performance BMPs.

If you are interested in obtaining recordings of the technical content presented at the 2021 National Watershed & Stormwater Conference, they are available for purchase by contacting Karen Titus at kmt@cwp.org.

What our attendees had to say

The 2021 National Watershed & Stormwater Conference received excellent feedback from our attendees, presenters, and sponsors. We’re very proud to put on these events and provide a venue for interactive learning and professional growth, and we’re lucky to have met so many wonderful people in the watershed and stormwater industry in the process! Here are some feedback highlights:

• “I think the CWP is the best annual conference […] I learn the most from this one, always great and interesting topics.”
• “I really liked the networking sessions. I actually do not love these at in person conferences. However, I thought these sessions (which I did not have high hopes for) were great. They really got me thinking about new topics and about our work in new ways. I love the free-flowing nature. It really allowed people to feel free to share and interact.”
• “Nearly every presentation I watched was excellent in both content and delivery.”
• “I appreciate all the attention you gave to the sponsors. The ease of joining presentations could not have been easier.”
• “Very professional and good information. I feel I can take away something to apply in our MS4 program which is one purpose for myself in attending conferences.”
• “This is probably the most fun and enjoyable virtual conference of the year. Keep up the good work y’all.”

How was the conference made possible?

We would like to express our sincere gratitude to the 17 industry sponsors who helped make this year’s National Watershed & Stormwater Conference such a tremendous success.

Patron: Ecotone

Platinum: In-Situ

Gold: Apex, YSI, Arcosa, CleanWay, Chesapeake Bay Trust

Silver: Watershed Consulting Associates LLC, Ernst Seeds, Century Engineering, Wapro, Luck Ecosystems

Bronze: OTT Hydromet, Lane Enterprises, STV Inc., Anderson Davis

Supporting: Stormcon

What’s the Center for Watershed Protection planning now?

Mark your calendars and pack your bags, because the 2022 National Watershed & Stormwater Conference will be back in-person in St. Petersburg, Florida!

The 2022 National Watershed & Stormwater Conference will be hosted at The Vinoy Renaissance St. Petersburg Resort & Golf Club from April 25^th to 28^th, 2022—so save the date! The 2022 Conference in St. Petersburg is currently planned to be an in-person-only event with “add-on” field trips/activities, so we look forward to seeing you there!

Also, the Center is continuing our specialty conference series after the success of our 2020 Coastal & Island Specialty Conference! This time around, we’ve decided to highlight the agriculture sector. We will be hosting the 2021 Sustainable Watersheds & Agriculture Symposium in Fulton, Maryland on October 26^th – 27^th, 2021. Keep an eye on our website for more details as they become available!