Quantitative analysis of impact of green stormwater infrastructures on combined sewer overflow control and urban flooding control

Abstract

Stimulated by the recent USEPA’s green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) guidance and policies, GSI systems have been widely implemented in the municipal area to control the combined sewer overflows (CSOs), also known as low impact development (LID) approaches. To quantitatively evaluate the performance of GSI systems on CSO and urban flooding control, USEPA-Stormwater Management Model (SWMM) model was adopted in this study to simulate the behaviors of GSI systems in a well-developed urban drainage area, PSW45, under different circumstances. The impact of different percentages of stormwater runoff transported from impervious surfaces to the GSI systems on CSO and urban flooding control has also been investigated. Results show that with current buildup, GSI systems in PSW45 have the best performance for low intensity and short duration events on both volume and peak flow reductions, and have the worst performance for high intensity and long duration events. Since the low intensity and short duration events are dominant from a long-term perspective, utilizing GSI systems is considered as an effective measure of CSO control to meet the long-term control strategy for PSW45 watershed. However, GSI systems are not suitable for the flooding control purpose in PSW45 due to the high occurrence possibility of urban flooding during or after high intensity events where GSI systems have relatively poor performance no matter for a short or long duration event.