AMES — A new grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture will support work to engage rural households who depend on private wells to understand drinking water quality and address potential problems.

The $590,000 grant, which provides support for a three-year term, is one of four projects nationwide approved as part of a USDA National Institute for Food and Agriculture Environmental and Natural Resource Economics initiative.

Jacqueline Comito, director of Iowa Learning Farms at Iowa State University, and Gabriel Lade, the C. Williams Swank Chair in Rural-Urban Policy at The Ohio State University, are leaders for the grant. Other collaborators are David Keiser, professor of water policy and management at the Yale School of the Environment and Catherine DeLong, water quality program manager with Iowa State University Extension and Outreach.

The research and education project builds on an earlier Iowa Rural Drinking Water Initiative led by Comito, Lade and Keiser that resulted in the 2022 report, The Iowa Rural Drinking Water Survey: Water Quality Perceptions and Avoidance Behaviors Among Rural Iowa Households.

A new round of surveys will be sent to 4,500 of the earlier respondents to see whether their interests in drinking water and related behaviors have changed. In addition, more households in new counties will be contacted, according to Lade. This round will also focus on strengthening the questions to elicit reliable and trustworthy responses. After the surveys, several listening sessions are also planned to gain more in-depth qualitative insights.

Find ISU Extension and Outreach information on resources currently available to well owners at: naturalresources.extension.iastate.edu/drinking-water-quality-iowa