The Paradox of the Rising Demand for Both a Better Environment and More Reliable Services

2002 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michel J. G. van Eeten ◽  
Emery Roe
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Landscapes ◽  
Fuel Load ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Reservoir Water ◽  
Endangered Fish ◽  
Urban Water Quality ◽  
Controlled Burning ◽  
Water Gate ◽  
Clean Air ◽  
To Come

The examples go on and on: loading fish in trucks and on barges to enable them to swim downstream; opening a water gate and drowning endangered birds in one area, or closing the gate and risk burning out habitat of the same species someplace else; spending more than $400 million a year to protect a handful of endangered species in just one region of a country; hatching endangered fish that end up too fat or stick out like neon in the water once released; releasing salmon trained to come to the surface for hatchery food when what is actually dropping from the sky are the ducks ready to eat them; keeping water in a reservoir to save the fish there, thus sacrificing other fish downstream; building a 250-foot-wide, 300-foot-high, $80 million device to better regulate the water temperature for salmon eggs in just one reservoir; controlled burning for fuel load management in the forests that harms not only air quality but also chronically bleeds pollution into adjacent aquatic ecosystems; breeding the wild properties out of endangered fish and releasing them, thereby polluting the gene pool of river fish; fighting urbanization to protect a green and open area, thereby condemning that area to monotonous, industrial agriculture and worse; closing a gate or releasing reservoir water in reaction to a sample of fish coming downstream and triggering electrical blackouts or the most severe urban water quality crisis in decades; restoring natural floodplains, erasing some of the oldest, best preserved, and greenest cultural landscapes in a country; putting in place even more massive infrastructure to keep ecosystems natural, thereby imprisoning them in intensive care units for life; and more. For some readers, these examples may appear a mix of the ridiculous and the desperate. Yet they are prime examples of a hard paradox at work: how do you reconcile the public’s demand for a better environment which requires ecosystem improvements with their concurrent demand for reliable services from that environment, including clean air, water, and power?

The influence of rainfall time resolution for urban water quality modelling

2010 ◽  
Vol 61 (9) ◽  
pp. 2381-2390 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabriele Freni ◽  
Giorgio Mannina ◽  
Gaspare Viviani
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Temporal Resolution ◽  
Rainfall Data ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Water Quality Modelling ◽  
Quality Model ◽  
Discharge Data ◽  
Urban Water Quality ◽  
Quality Aspects ◽  
The Impact

The objective of this paper is the definition of a methodology to evaluate the impact of the temporal resolution of rainfall measurements in urban drainage modelling applications. More specifically the effect of the temporal resolution on urban water quality modelling is detected analysing the uncertainty of the response of rainfall–runoff modelling. Analyses have been carried out using historical rainfall–discharge data collected for the Fossolo catchment (Bologna, Italy). According to the methodology, the historical rainfall data are taken as a reference, and resampled data have been obtained through a rescaling procedure with variable temporal windows. The shape comparison between ‘true’ and rescaled rainfall data has been carried out using a non-dimensional accuracy index. Monte Carlo simulations have been carried out applying a parsimonious urban water quality model, using the recorded data and the resampled events. The results of the simulations were used to derive the cumulative probabilities of quantity and quality model outputs (peak discharges, flow volume, peak concentrations and pollutant mass) conditioned on the observation according to the GLUE (Generalized Likelihood Uncertainty Estimation) methodology. The results showed that when coarser rainfall information is available, the model calibration process is still efficient even if modelling uncertainty progressively increases especially with regards to water quality aspects.

Road traffic impact on urban water quality: a step towards integrated traffic, air and stormwater modelling

2013 ◽  
Vol 21 (8) ◽  
pp. 5297-5310 ◽  
Author(s):  
Masoud Fallah Shorshani ◽  
Céline Bonhomme ◽  
Guido Petrucci ◽  
Michel André ◽  
Christian Seigneur
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Road Traffic ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Urban Water Quality ◽  
Traffic Impact

scholarly journals An integrated approach for urban water quality assessment

2011 ◽  
Vol 64 (7) ◽  
pp. 1519-1526 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. S. Beenen ◽  
J. G. Langeveld ◽  
H. J. Liefting ◽  
R. H. Aalderink ◽  
H. Velthorst
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Drainage System ◽  
Water Quality Assessment ◽  
Integrated Approach ◽  
Urban Drainage ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Sewer System ◽  
Urban Drainage System ◽  
Urban Water Quality ◽  
Receiving Water

This paper introduces an integrated approach for the assessment of receiving water quality and the relative contribution of the urban drainage system to perceived receiving water quality problems. The approach combines mass balances with relatively simple receiving water impact models. The research project has learned that the urban drainage system is only one of the determining factors with respect to receiving urban water quality problems. The morphology of the receiving waters and the non-sewer sources of pollution, such as waterbirds, dogs, or inflow of external surface water might be equally important. This conclusion underlines the necessity to changes today's emission based approach and adopt an integral and immission based approach. The integrated approach is illustrated on a case study in Arnhem, where the receiving water quality remained unsatisfactory even after retrofitting a combined sewer system into a separated sewer system.

scholarly journals Regulatory and Resource Management Practices for Urban Watersheds: The Florida Experience

2012 ◽  
Vol 22 (4) ◽  
pp. 418-429 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard O. Carey ◽  
George J. Hochmuth ◽  
Christopher J. Martinez ◽  
Treavor H. Boyer ◽  
Vimala D. Nair ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Resource Management ◽  
Atmospheric Deposition ◽  
Management Practices ◽  
The United States ◽  
Nutrient Concentrations ◽  
Septic Systems ◽  
Urban Watersheds ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Urban Water Quality

Urban water quality management is becoming an increasingly complex and widespread problem. The long-term viability of aquatic ecosystems draining urban watersheds can be addressed through both regulatory and nutrient and water management initiatives. This review focuses on U.S. regulatory (federal, state, and local) and management (runoff, atmospheric deposition, and wastewater) impacts on urban water quality, specifically emphasizing programs in Florida. Because of rapid population growth in recent decades, and projected increases in the future, appropriate resource management in Florida is essential. Florida enacted stormwater regulations in 1979, before the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) amended the Clean Water Act (CWA) to regulate stormwater discharges. However, in the United States, more research has been conducted on larger structural best management practices (BMPs) (e.g., wet ponds, detention basins, etc.) compared with smaller onsite alternatives (e.g., green roofs, permeable pavements, etc.). For atmospheric deposition, research is needed to investigate processes contributing to enhanced deposition rates. Wastewater (from septic systems, treatment plants, and landfills) management is especially important in urban watersheds. Failing septic systems, elevated nutrient concentrations in discharged effluent, and landfill leachate can all potentially degrade water quality. Proposed numeric nutrient criteria from the USEPA and innovative technologies such as bioreactor landfills are emergent regulatory and management strategies for improved urban water quality.

scholarly journals Characterization and Modeling of Urban Water Quality in the City of Calgary, Canada

2017 ◽  
Vol 08 (08) ◽  
pp. 513-530
Author(s):  
Dhiraj Shrestha ◽  
Jianxun He
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Urban Water Quality ◽  
The City

Pinellas County Resource Recovery Facility Capital Replacement Project: “Securing a Retrofit Investment — A Capital Replacement Initiative”

2001 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Peter Stasis ◽  
Robert E. Henson ◽  
Ronald D. Larson
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Protection Agency ◽  
Resource Recovery ◽  
The United States ◽  
Waste To Energy ◽  
Air Pollution Control ◽  
Operating Life ◽  
Pinellas County ◽  
Clean Air ◽  
To Come ◽  
Capital Replacement

Abstract The Clean Air Act Amendments (CAAA) promulgated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1990 set new emission standards for Waste-To-Energy (WTE) plants throughout the United States. Pinellas County, Florida, has achieved compliance with the new emission guidelines by completing an Air Pollution Control Retrofit to their Resource Recovery Facility (PCRRF) in 2000. Pinellas County, the owner of the PCRRF, now faces the challenge of preserving this investment for the years to come. This paper describes the additional investments being made by Pinellas County as part of the Capital Replacement Project (CRP) to extend the operating life of PCRRF.

Stadt und Wald, eine neue Symbiose? (Essay) | Cities and forests – a new symbiosis? (essay)

2008 ◽  
Vol 159 (8) ◽  
pp. 216-219
Author(s):  
Peter Baccini
Keyword(s):  
Urban Design ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Cultural Landscapes ◽  
Integrated Approach ◽  
Natural Sciences ◽  
Environmental Research ◽  
The Political ◽  
To Come ◽  
Water Cycles

Forests, from a natural sciences perspective, are long-living ecosystems. After fifty years of intensive environmental research, their crucial role in global and regional carbon and water cycles and in the development of biodiversity is now understood much better; therefore, the political efforts to protect forests have increased. However, if seen in too narrow a way, the paradigm of “protection” endangers the opening towards an integrated approach to urban design in which new and alternative types of forests may play an important role in the evolution of new cultural landscapes. It is a sociopolitical decision that is still to come.

Afrasian Aesthetics in M.G. Vassanji’s The Magic of Saida

Matatu ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 52 (1) ◽  
pp. 176-187
Author(s):  
J.K.S. Makokha
Keyword(s):  
Racial Identity ◽  
Early Adolescence ◽  
Cultural Landscapes ◽  
Dar Es Salaam ◽  
The Novel ◽  
East African ◽  
Central Figure ◽  
The Past ◽  
Indian Identity ◽  
To Come

Abstract The Magic of Saida by M.G. Vassanji (2012) centres on the central figure of the novel’s story, Kamal. He is the son of an African mother and an Asian (read Indian) father, who grows up in Tanzania and then relocates to Canada where he becomes an established doctor. The novel tackles themes of African-Asian (read Afrasian) racial identity, belonging, and the effects of the past on the present. Kamal identifies mainly as an African when residing with his mother in Kilwa during his childhood; he is then urged to embrace an Indian identity when he is sent to live with his uncle in Dar es Salaam in his early adolescence. Decades after moving to Edmonton, Canada, Kamal decides to come back to Kilwa. This paper explores the tension and ambiguity in Kamal’s identity by analyzing the way he defines himself—or is defined—in Kilwa and Dar es Salaam, and then investigating, through an eclectic psychochriticism lens, how that in turn affects him as he ages and drives him to return in seach of what it means to be both an Asian and an African in the context of East African cultural landscapes.

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