The Center for Watershed Protection (CWP) is pleased to announce the release of a new, simple tool to help communities in the Chesapeake Bay more easily and consistently estimate the water quality benefits of proposed stormwater retrofit and greening projects. The Green Stormwater Infrastructure siMple Pollutant Load reduction Estimator (Green SIMPLE) tool was specifically developed for use by organizations conducting planning and implementation of stormwater retrofits and community greening projects in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, with a specific focus on lower-capacity entities such as neighborhood associations, non-profits, and small local governments.
The Green SIMPLE tool is an easy-to-use spreadsheet that is consistent with the pollutant loading rates and load reduction efficiencies used in the Chesapeake Bay Program’s suite of modeling tools. Its primary uses are to 1) estimate pollutant load reductions from individual stormwater retrofit, community greening, and/or rainwater harvesting projects, and 2) compare a suite of candidate projects based on factors such as cost-effectiveness, pollutant load reduction, maintenance burden, and constructability. The tool also helps users better understand how to get required inputs such as drainage area to the proposed project. The Chesapeake Bay Trust has made the Green SIMPLE tool available for use by applicants and grantees of their funding programs and it can also be applied to support many other restoration planning efforts across the Chesapeake Bay watershed.
For more information about the Green SIMPLE tool, contact Amanda Pollack (ahp at cwp dot org) or Karen Cappiella (kc at cwp dot org).
CWP would like to thank our funding partners the Chesapeake Bay Trust, the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Region 3, and Maryland Department of Natural Resources. This project was funded wholly or in part by the U.S. EPA under assistance agreement CB96358501 to Maryland Department of Natural Resources. The contents of the tool do not necessarily reflect the views and policies of the EPA, nor does the EPA endorse trade names or recommend the use of commercial products mentioned in the tool.
