About Regional Monitoring Networks

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Learn about RMNs

Photo showing some of the members of a RMNs effort.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is working with its regional offices and with states, tribes, and other entities to establish Regional Monitoring Networks (RMNs) for freshwater wadeable streams, freshwater inland lakes, and wetlands. 


RMN data can be used for many purposes over both short and long timeframes. These applications include:

  • Informing water quality criteria and biological criteria development
  • Prioritizing areas for protection
  • Refining lists of biological, thermal, and hydrological indicators
  • Detecting trends in water quality over time
  • Detecting trends in biological indicators over time

RMN data serve a wide audience: state and local government agencies, tribes, environmental managers, scientists/researchers, policy makers, the general public (e.g., educators) and others. The data are valuable to track conditions over shorter and longer timeframes. Data uses include:

  • Understanding current (“baseline”) conditions
  • Detecting and tracking trends (how lakes, streams, or wetlands change over time and what drives the changes)
  • Distinguishing year-to-year variability from long-term changes
  • Understanding how thermal and hydrological conditions affect aquatic communities in lakes, streams, and wetlands
  • Understanding how thermal and hydrological conditions interact with other stressors such as siltation, chemical pollution, flow alteration, and nutrient enrichment
  • Understanding ecosystem responses and recovery from extreme weather events
  • Detecting and tracking effects of regional phenomena such as climate variability, atmospheric deposition, and spread of invasive species
  • Enhancing the resilience of lakes, streams, and wetlands to environmental stressors
     

Managers will be able to use the monitoring data to help inform adaptive management strategies at local and regional levels.

The RMNs help other monitoring programs fill data gaps and improve consistency of data collection protocols among monitoring groups. The RMNs also facilitate implementation of emerging technologies, such as sensors that allow continuous temperature, dissolved oxygen, and water level monitoring. Some monitoring protocols, for example for temperature sensors, are common across the different types of RMNs. Table 1 describes temperature protocols, while the water body specific protocols are described under those RMN pages.

RMNs are volunteer efforts to collect monitoring data at targeted sites to document current conditions, establish baselines, and detect changes over time. Consistent methods are used across sites to increase the comparability of data, minimize biases and random variation, and ensure that the data meet data quality objectives. The goal is to co-locate RMN sites with existing long-term state/tribal monitoring sites to minimize the need for additional resources.

RMN surveys build on existing state and tribal bioassessment efforts with annual sampling of a limited number of sites that can be evaluated at a regional level. Regional analyses improve the ability to detect trends over shorter time periods. Some stream RMN sites have collected data since 2012. Subsequently, EPA Regions 1, 2, 3, and 5, in coordination with their states and tribes, began developing RMNs for inland lakes and wetlands with the same objectives as the RMNs for streams.  Many of the RMN sites are located on high quality waters. Monitoring high quality waters fits in with the long-term vision and goals for several Clean Water Act (CWA) programs.

How are sites selected?

Sites are selected through:

  • Scientific criteria (e.g., vulnerability assessment plus other criteria such as level of disturbance, sampling record)
  • Practical considerations (e.g., locations of existing monitoring program sites, risk of future development, accessibility)
  • Technical standardizations (e.g., proximity to active USGS gauges if available, sustainability of sampling, equipment)
     

Where do RMNs exist?

This photo shows a member of the RMNs collecting samples in a stream.

Currently there are stream RMNs in the eastern and midwestern United States (Figure 1) and lake RMNs in the northeast and midwestern United States (Figure 2). Wetland RMNs are under development in the Mid-Atlantic (EPA Regions 2 and 3; Figure 3) and under consideration in the Northeast (EPA Region 1) and the Upper Midwest (EPA Region 5) of the United States. The RMN framework is flexible and allows for expansion to new EPA Regions.   

Figure 1. The black triangles show locations of primary Stream RMN sites and grey circles show secondary sites as of 5/31/2024. Stream RMN sampling efforts began in EPA Region 1 in the Northeast in 2012, followed by EPA Region 4 in the Southeast in 2013, EPA Regions 2 and 3 in the Mid-Atlantic in 2014, and EPA Region 5 in the Midwest in 2016-2017.
Figure 1. The black triangles show locations of primary Stream RMN sites and grey circles show secondary sites as of 5/31/2024. Stream RMN sampling efforts began in EPA Region 1 in the Northeast in 2012, followed by EPA Region 4 in the Southeast in 2013, EPA Regions 2 and 3 in the Mid-Atlantic in 2014, and EPA Region 5 in the Midwest in 2016-2017. 
Figure 2. Circles show Lake RMN sites as of 12/20/2024. Implementation of the lake RMNs began on a limited basis in 2018.
Figure 2. Circles show Lake RMN sites as of 12/20/2024. Implementation of the lake RMNs began on a limited basis in 2018.
Figure 3. Locations of top candidate Wetland RMN sites in EPA Regions 2 and 3 as of 12/16/2022. Five of these sites (Cranberry Glades, WV, Hickory Run, PA, Bruce Lake, PA, Dennis Creek Tidal Marsh, NJ, and Canary Creek, DE) are collecting data through wells and sensors.
Figure 3. Locations of top candidate Wetland RMN sites in EPA Regions 2 and 3 as of 12/16/2022. Five of these sites (Cranberry Glades, WV, Hickory Run, PA, Bruce Lake, PA, Dennis Creek Tidal Marsh, NJ, and Canary Creek, DE) are collecting data through wells and sensors.

Join a Regional Monitoring Network

If you want to join an RMN, they are open to anyone who wants to join.

The process for setting up an RMNs includes five steps:

  1. Forming a regional working group and refining RMNs goals for the region
  2. Discussing site selection criteria, data collection methods, and logistics
  3. Identifying logistical, training and equipment needs
  4. Developing a plan for sharing and analyzing the data
  5. Implementing the plan and data collection
     

To date, our partners are primarily state and tribal biomonitoring programs, but other agencies (e.g., USGS) and academia are participating or collaborating as well. Use the contact us form (linked at the bottom left of this page) to let us know where you are, and we will provide you with the information you need for the next steps. If there is an existing RMN in your region, we will connect you with that regional RMN lead. If there is not, then we can help guide you through the process of starting a new RMN. We also can share ideas about how to get others to join.

Collaboration advantages:

  • Sharing the burden of long-term monitoring by dividing monitoring efforts by type of data or by monitoring locations
  • Increasing the number of sampling locations and thereby the statistical power to detect small, long-term trends
  • Sharing expertise in data collection and data management
  • Leveraging equipment and other resources
  • Sharing lessons learned, particularly for newer sensors or measures
  • Testing innovative methods
     
Photo of a sunset on a lake.

Regional Monitoring Networks (RMNs)

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Last updated on January 21, 2025