Emergency Response Research Webinar Series
Free webinars typically held on the second Wednesday of the month. Special webinars on COVID-19 research are conducted as research results become available.
EPA hosts this webinar series to share current research activities and results. This webinar series covers the latest information on research supporting EPA's response to chemical, biological, and radiological incidents, as well as natural disasters. This forum allows EPA to communicate directly with partners and stakeholders to foster collaboration and dissemination of information.
NOTE: Attendees have the option of receiving a certificate of attendance. Acceptance of certificates is contingent on organization requirements—EPA cannot guarantee acceptance. Closed-captioned recordings of the webinars are provided below for later viewing and as a training resource; certificates cannot be provided for viewing webinar recordings.
Webinar dates and topics are subject to change.
On this page:
Upcoming Webinar
Emergency Deployment of Water Treatment Systems During Disasters
Wednesday, March 11, 2026, 2:00 - 3:00 PM ET
Following an emergency event, communities need access to clean water for various daily activities and medical purposes. EPA partnered with WaterStep to develop a modular, mobile water treatment system known as Water on Wheels - Emergency Mobile Water Treatment System (WOW Cart). The WOW Cart is an inexpensive and versatile water treatment system about the size of a shopping cart that has been deployed in response to hurricanes, tornadoes, and other disasters.
Multiple deployments and discussions with stakeholders have highlighted the lack of a pre-approval process for short-term emergency drinking water systems among many states. This may limit the ability to use such capabilities and get clean water to affected areas quickly.
This webinar will provide an overview of the WOW Cart and the Association of State Drinking Water Administrators will discuss their survey of state programs on pre-approval of short-term emergency drinking water systems. It will discuss Kentucky's Lily Pad program, including guidelines for acceptance and monitoring of systems, pre-deployments, and training water utility staff in the operation of these systems.
About the Presenters
James Goodrich is a Senior Science Advisor with EPA's Office of Applied Science and Environmental Solutions located in Cincinnati, OH. He has a Ph.D. and a B.S. from the University of Cincinnati and an M.S. from Florida State University. He is currently responsible for development, evaluation, and deployment of innovative emergency water treatment technology systems following natural and man-made disasters, adaptations of river spill models, stormwater infrastructure contamination mitigation tools, and full-scale evaluations of drinking water infrastructure decontamination approaches. During his career, he has managed large multidisciplinary research programs relative to water infrastructure protection, small community drinking water and wastewater needs, watershed protection and restoration, source water spill modeling, and international drinking water treatment technology demonstrations.
Kevin Letterly is the Government Affairs Manager at the Association of State and Drinking Water Administrators (ASDWA), where he has worked for seven years leading congressional engagement and drinking water policy efforts related to regulatory implementation, infrastructure funding, and drinking water security. He also leads ASDWA's Drinking Water Security and Emergency Response Committee.
2026 Schedule
If you are interested in being notified when new webinars are scheduled, please sign up to receive email notifications here: Receive emails for upcoming webinars.
Topic and presenters are subject to change. Additional information and registration links will be provided in advance of each webinar.
| Date | Topic |
|---|---|
| March 2026 | Emergency Deployment of Water Treatment Systems During Disasters |
Past Webinars
Recordings and other materials from past webinars are available below. Recordings are hosted on EPA's YouTube channel. Certificates cannot be provided for watching the webinar recordings.
| Date | Topic and Presenter(s) |
|---|---|
| February 11, 2026 | Cleanup of Fentanyl Contaminated Surfaces and Associated Waste Management Presenters: Lukas Oudejans, Office of Land and Emergency Management; Matthew Magnuson, Office of Applied Science and Environmental Solutions; Kristin Fitzgerald, Office of Land and Emergency Management |
| July 9, 2025 | Animal Carcass Disposal for a Foreign Animal Disease Outbreak Presenters: Joseph Wood, Office of Research and Development; Shannon Serre, Office of Land and Emergency Management |
| June 11, 2025 | Assessing Lithium-ion Battery Discharge and Measuring Emissions Presenter: Souhail Al-Abed, Office of Research and Development |
| May 14, 2025 | AI in Disaster Preparedness, Response, and Recovery Presenter: Timothy Boe, Office of Research and Development |
| April 9, 2025 | Leveraging Stormwater Modeling to Prepare and Recover from Emergencies Presenter: Anne Mikelonis, Office of Research and Development |
| March 12, 2025 | Managing Contaminated Drinking Water Post-Hurricane Presenter: Chelsea Hintz, Office of Research and Development |
| February 12, 2025 | Cleaning up Soil Contaminated with Pathogens Presenters: Joseph Wood, Office of Research and Development; Shannon Serre, Office of Land and Emergency Management |
| December 11, 2024 | Local Partnerships: Developing Solutions for Rapid Needs Presenters: Helen Buse, Office of Research and Development; Jatin Mistry, EPA Region 6 |
| November 13, 2024 | Protective Actions & Decontamination: Radiological Incident Response Presenters: Matthew Magnuson, Office of Research and Development; Ken Yale, Office of Radiation and Indoor Air |
| October 9, 2024 | EPA's Water Security Test Bed: Critical Infrastructure Research Presenter: Jeff Szabo, Office of Research and Development |
| September 11, 2024 | Wildfire Impacts on Water Infrastructure Presenters: William Platten, Office of Water; Samantha Bishop, EPA Region 9; Levi Haupert, Office of Research and Development |
| August 14, 2024 | Testing Chemical Warfare Agent Response in a Realistic Setting Presenters: Lukas Oudejans, Office of Research and Development; Shannon Serre, Office of Land and Emergency Management; James Justice, EPA Region 5 |
| July 10, 2024 | Clean Water Access During Emergencies Presenters: James Goodrich, Office of Research and Development and Dave Carney, Kentucky's Department for Public Health |
| June 12, 2024 | EPA's Wind Tunnel: Modeling Urban Wind Flow & Dispersion Presenter: Michael Pirhalla, Office of Research and Development |
| May 8, 2024 | Pathogen Contaminated Wastewater: Where Does it Go & How to Treat it Presenter: Adam Burdsall, Office of Research and Development |
| April 10, 2024 | Oil Spill Response: Advances in Detection Capabilities Presenter: Robyn Conmy, Office of Research and Development |
| February 14, 2024 | Protecting Drinking Water Sources with EPA's River Spill Model Presenters: James Goodrich, Office of Research and Development and Sam Dinkins, Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission |
More Webinars
Special Topics
Cleanup, Remediation & Decontamination
- Toxic Aromatherapy: A Melioidosis Mystery (2023)
- Fentanyl Decontamination (2023)
- Clean or Replace? Decontaminating PFAS from Firefighting Equipment and Hangars (2022)
- Considering Trade-offs in Contamination Cleanup (2022)
- Readily Available Equipment for Response and Recovery (2021)
- Neutralization and Attenuation of Ricin Toxin (2019)
- Decontamination Strategy and Technology Selection Tool (DeconST) (2014)
- Remediation of Soils Contaminated with Bacillus anthracis Spores (2014)
Large Scale Demos
- Analysis for Coastal Operational Resiliency (AnCOR)-Wide Area Demonstration (2023)
- Underground Transportation Restoration Research (2018)
- Responding to a Chemical Warfare Incident: From Sampling and Analysis to Decontamination and Waste Management (2017)
Community Resilience & Social Science
- Equitable Resilience Builder (2023)
- Building Relationships and Trust in Contamination Cleanup (2023)
- Environmental Resilience Tools Wizard (2021)
- Promoting Community Resilience through Social Science (2021)
Sampling & Analysis
- Innovative Sampling for Large-Scale Biological Outdoor Contaminated Events (2023)
- Facilitating Coordinated Response from Field to Lab: the Environmental Sampling and Analysis Methods (ESAM) Program (2022)
- Biothreat Agent Detection: Advances in Rapid Analytical Methods (2021)
- Virtual Reality: A Training Tool for Biological Sampling (2020)
- EPA's Environmental Sampling and Analytical Methods for Environmental Remediation and Recovery (2018)
- Water Security and Resiliency (2018)
- USGS/EPA Collaboration: Bacillus anthracis in American Soils: From Sample Collection to Data Application (2014)
COVID-19 Research
- COVID-19: Evaluating Aerosol Treatment Technologies (2022)
- COVID-19: Aerosol Treatment Devices & Ozone Disinfection (2021)
- COVID-19: Electrostatic Sprayers and Foggers for Disinfectant Application (2021)
- Reducing Environmental Exposure to SARS-CoV-2: An Overview of Findings (2021)
- COVID-19: Cleaning & Disinfecting of PPE for Effective Reuse (2021)
- COVID-19: UV-C Devices and Methods for Surface Disinfection (2021)
- COVID-19 Long Lasting Disinfectants (2020)
- EPA Expands Research on COVID-19 in the Environment (2020)
Oil Spills
Waste Management
- Incident Waste Decision Support Tool (I-WASTE) Training (2024)
- Waste Estimation Case Studies to Support Planning for Natural and Manmade Disasters (2023)
- Pre-Incident Planning for CBRN Waste Management (2022)
- Incident Waste Decision Support Tool (I-WASTE) (2020)
Data Management
Wildfires and Natural Disasters
- Underground Storage Tanks: Preparing and Responding to Extreme Events (2022)
- Remediating Premise Plumbing Following a Water Emergency or Disaster (2022)
Water Security
- Tools, Training and Technical Assistance to Increase Water System Resilience (2024)
- Cybersecurity (2023)
- Building Resiliency: Emergency Water Treatment System (2021)
- Water Network Tool for Resilience (2020)
- Removal of Organic Contaminants from Polyethylene Drinking Water Pipes by Flushing (2018)
- Premise Plumbing Research in EPA's Homeland Security Research Program (2018)
- Water Security and Resiliency (2017)
- EPA's Water Security Test Bed (2015)
- TEVA-SPOT Consequence Evaluation Module and EPA-RTX (2014)