Meet MCEA's new Water Resources Specialist
By Sarah Horner, MCEA Communications Director
Andrew Hillman spent years studying how to reduce water pollution caused by industrial agricultural practices before joining MCEA this past summer.
After completing his Master's in Biological and Agricultural Engineering at North Carolina State University, he knew he could likely land a lucrative engineering job. But he also knew that wasn’t where he could make the most headway on the problems he cares about.
“It’s become clear to me that the reason we haven’t moved the needle on agricultural pollution is not because of an engineering problem. The technology needed to reduce these water impacts already exists, and there’s plenty of research showing that alternative farming practices are effective. And yet, we’re not seeing results,” Andrew said.
That’s largely because there isn’t the political will, policy, or funding necessary to scale the technologies and practices.
“We’re talking about a problem that spills into food supply conversations and the farm bill and even into people’s diets. It can be really contentious and challenging to figure out how to bring people together to influence policy around those issues, but that’s where I see the most potential for real change.”
It was both MCEA’s track record of engaging on a wide range of water quality issues and the organization’s commitment to pursuing systemic change to address entrenched problems that led Andrew to accept a job here.
As our new Water Resources Specialist, Andrew is using his technical expertise to translate the latest scientific research on longstanding water quality issues into accessible information we can use to push for legal and policy solutions both in courtrooms and at the Capitol. At the top of his to-do list are initiatives MCEA is engaged on to reduce water pollution caused by industrial agricultural practices like drainage systems, confined animal feedlots, and monoculture cropping systems.
We sat down with Andrew for a Q&A to learn more about his background and how he’ll put it to work at MCEA.
Q: Tell us more about your background before coming to MCEA
A: I grew up in Iowa, and I got my Bachelor’s Degree from Iowa State University in Biological Systems Engineering, where I focused on how to address the environmental impacts from agriculture. During that time, I worked as an intern for two summers on the University’s Extension project, where I conducted extensive education and outreach to community members and farmers about ways to improve water quality both on individual farms and community-wide. After completing my Master's, I returned to the Midwest to pursue my PhD at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in environment and resources. That program exposed me to all the work happening on this front in the nonprofit ecosystem, leading me to find MCEA.
Q: What’s a project you’re working on at MCEA?
A: Minnesota is getting ready to examine its rules governing groundwater, and that’s a big area of interest for MCEA for a lot of reasons, one of which is our work to better protect drinking water from nitrate pollution caused by agricultural run-off. I’m doing a lot of research right now into what the latest science says about what’s been happening with nitrate in groundwater since Minnesota’s old groundwater rules were adopted. That research will hopefully help us convince our state agencies that our rules need to be stronger.
Q: What do you see as some of the biggest threats to Minnesota’s water right now?
A: To me, it’s nonpoint source pollution because that’s the pollution we have the most trouble tracking and regulating. That’s where agricultural drainage systems and other kinds of unregulated agricultural practices come in, all of which cause pretty major impacts to Minnesota’s local water bodies, especially in the southern half of the state, not to mention the downstream impacts they cause from the Mississippi River.
As it stands, we don’t have many levers to influence those agricultural practices, so it’s going to take unique policy approaches and long-term thinking to see results. The good news is MCEA has already started this work with the drainage petition it filed with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency over the summer, and the petition it filed with the Environmental Protection Agency a few years ago on nitrate contamination. So we’re off to a good start.
Q: How is water culture in Minnesota different from what it was like in Iowa?
A: I love Iowa, but the water there is not in good shape. I remember canoeing a few times for summer camp growing up, and the water was just gross. It was dirty and kinda smelly and that’s just what I thought canoeing was like. It wasn’t until I was kayaking in Wisconsin and could see down to the bottom of the lake that I realized what I’d been missing. The waters are even more pristine and beautiful in Minnesota.
It’s hard to get people in Iowa to care about protecting the water when it’s so degraded and just not part of their daily lives. I really enjoy how different that is in Minnesota. I feel like there is so much community support for what MCEA and Minnesota’s state agencies are trying to do to protect the water here because people feel so connected to it. I hope Minnesotans continue to take that seriously and keep working to protect it, because what you have here is rare and worth fighting for.