Fungal Remediation of Petroleum Hydrocarbons

Presentation Abstract

The Olympia Mycelial Network (OMN) is an all-volunteer group working to share knowledge and skills related to the use of fungi for increasing personal and environmental health. We seek to de-stigmatize and simplify mushroom cultivation to create greater access for all people to the benefits of edible, medicinal, and remediative mushrooms. Our outreach focuses on small-scale, low-cost, home or community-scale cultivation; community engagement via free/inexpensive workshops and community mushroom installations; creating medicinal mushroom products; and working to implement local remediation projects to remediate polluted areas. The OMN is non-discriminatory, open to people of all backgrounds and levels of engagement with fungi.

The group has been operating for over three years. In that time we have been collaborating with business owners, coops, and collectives around town to facilitate our workshops to further our goals. With the right resources we would team up with more local business owners and set up filtrations systems that filter contaminated run off from parking lots and roads. We would use a control at each site and bioassays to back up the work. From these sites we would collect the toxic material to build off-site designs to perfect methods of stabilizing and rehabilitating soil with fungi and bacteria.

There are several species of fungi that are well known for their ability to degrade PAH's, herbicides, petroleum products, and organophosphates among many other common pollutants. With funding we would do Total Petroleum Hydrocarbon testing, and testing to target contaminants with specific species of fungi. With this data we would help other cities get the stats and funding they need to also implement similar systems. All of these experiments and their conclusions would be publicly accessible. This project would bring attention to waste water pollution while empowering individuals and business owners to be proactive about their ecological impact.

Session Title

Remediation

Conference Track

Protection, Remediation, & Restoration

Conference Name

Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference (2016 : Vancouver, B.C.)

Document Type

Event

Start Date

2016 12:00 AM

End Date

2016 12:00 AM

Location

2016SSEC

Type of Presentation

Poster

Genre/Form

conference proceedings; presentations (communicative events)

Contributing Repository

Digital content made available by University Archives, Heritage Resources, Western Libraries, Western Washington University.

Subjects – Topical (LCSH)

Fungi--Reproduction; Environmental education--Activity programs

Geographic Coverage

Salish Sea (B.C. and Wash.)

Comments

https://olympiamycelialnetwork.wordpress.com

https://www.facebook.com/TheOlympiaMycelialNetwork/

Rights

This resource is displayed for educational purposes only and may be subject to U.S. and international copyright laws. For more information about rights or obtaining copies of this resource, please contact University Archives, Heritage Resources, Western Libraries, Western Washington University, Bellingham, WA 98225-9103, USA (360-650-7534; heritage.resources@wwu.edu) and refer to the collection name and identifier. Any materials cited must be attributed to the Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference Records, University Archives, Heritage Resources, Western Libraries, Western Washington University.

Type

Text

Language

English

Format

application/pdf

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Fungal Remediation of Petroleum Hydrocarbons

2016SSEC

The Olympia Mycelial Network (OMN) is an all-volunteer group working to share knowledge and skills related to the use of fungi for increasing personal and environmental health. We seek to de-stigmatize and simplify mushroom cultivation to create greater access for all people to the benefits of edible, medicinal, and remediative mushrooms. Our outreach focuses on small-scale, low-cost, home or community-scale cultivation; community engagement via free/inexpensive workshops and community mushroom installations; creating medicinal mushroom products; and working to implement local remediation projects to remediate polluted areas. The OMN is non-discriminatory, open to people of all backgrounds and levels of engagement with fungi.

The group has been operating for over three years. In that time we have been collaborating with business owners, coops, and collectives around town to facilitate our workshops to further our goals. With the right resources we would team up with more local business owners and set up filtrations systems that filter contaminated run off from parking lots and roads. We would use a control at each site and bioassays to back up the work. From these sites we would collect the toxic material to build off-site designs to perfect methods of stabilizing and rehabilitating soil with fungi and bacteria.

There are several species of fungi that are well known for their ability to degrade PAH's, herbicides, petroleum products, and organophosphates among many other common pollutants. With funding we would do Total Petroleum Hydrocarbon testing, and testing to target contaminants with specific species of fungi. With this data we would help other cities get the stats and funding they need to also implement similar systems. All of these experiments and their conclusions would be publicly accessible. This project would bring attention to waste water pollution while empowering individuals and business owners to be proactive about their ecological impact.