The National Water Quality Monitoring Council will host its 13th National Monitoring Conference during the week of April 24–28, 2023, in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Monitoring for water quality/quantity and public and ecological health in all water resources will be represented, including lakes and wetlands, rivers and streams, coastal waters and estuaries, and groundwater. All federal, state, tribal and local water professionals, nonprofits, academia, water consultants and industry, and volunteer scientists are welcome at this important national forum.  The conference will be offered in a hybrid format primarily in person, including a limited virtual format.

Networking and opportunities to create new relationships will abound for attendees. Whether you seek to develop new skills, learn about the latest technologies, or simply exchange information on a wide variety of topics relevant to water resources, the National Monitoring Conference is for you. The conference attracts the highest quality professional papers and posters and is a destination conference for many in the field.

Please look for the Call for Session Proposals and Call for Abstracts in Spring and Summer of 2022.

2023 Conference Themes Include:

• 50 Years After the Clean Water Act and Similar Efforts — a retrospective & prospective; lessons learned in water quality condition, assessment, justice & equity and long-term trend monitoring
• Effectiveness Monitoring — Are management actions working? Restoration results, best management practices, monitoring and education/outreach successes, inform priorities and track progress in protecting and restoring the condition of our nation’s waters
• Protecting High Quality Waters — monitoring to identify and evaluate waters; inform/implement protection strategies
• Monitoring Collaboration — national, tribal, regional, state and local initiatives, partnerships, and councils; inclusive stakeholder identification and engagement; Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion
• Volunteer and Community-Based Monitoring — volunteer monitoring, school & community groups and watershed associations, data to action, stewardship, increasing diversity & inclusion
• Aggregating, Analyzing,Visualizing & Disseminating Data and Information — Open data science tools and tool development; data portals; data equity; R-Shiny applications, story maps, and dashboards; communicating assessment, condition, and trends to decision makers and public
• Hot Topics in Monitoring and Analysis
  • Climate Change (impacts on quantity, quality, and biota)
  • Harmful Algal Blooms (freshwater & marine)
  • Persistent Toxic Contaminants (emerging and bioaccumulative contaminants, including PFAS)
  • Nutrients (dynamics, impacts, monitoring, modeling, and analysis)
  • Source Identification (nonpoint source, point source, stormwater, atmospheric deposition)
  • New and Emerging Technologies (in situ and continuous monitoring, remote sensing, analytical methods, eDNA)
  • Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning