Great Plains/Rocky Mountain Hazardous Substance Research Center (HSRC)

Kansas State University (KSU) leads the fourteen-institution consortium for the Great Plains/Rocky Mountain Hazardous Substance Research Center (HSRC). The other member institutions are Lincoln, Haskell Indian Nations, Colorado State, Montana State, South Dakota State, and Utah State Universities, along with the universities of Iowa, Northern Iowa, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Utah, and Wyoming. The center was established in 1989 to conduct research pertaining to hazardous substances produced through agriculture, forestry, mining, mineral processing, and other activities. It serves Federal Regions 7 and 8. Specific research projects focus on soil and water contaminated by heavy metals from mining wastes and other industrial activities, soil and groundwater contaminated by organic chemicals, wood preservatives that contaminate groundwater, pesticides identified as hazardous substances, improved technologies and methods for characterizing and analyzing contaminated soil, and waste-minimization and pollution-prevention methods and technologies.