River Basin In Spain Research Articles

Public Participation in Water Planning in the Ebro River Basin (Spain) and Tucson Basin (U.S., Arizona): Impact on Water Policy and Adaptive Capacity Building

The benefits of public participation in water management are recognized by governments, scholars, and stakeholders. These benefits, however, do not result from all engagement endeavors. This leads to the question: What are the determinants for effective public participation? Given a list of criteria for achieving the transformational capacity of participation, we analyze the benefits (including the influence on public policies) gained through public participation and the determinant factors for obtaining these benefits in the Ebro River Basin in Spain and in the Tucson Basin in Arizona (U.S.). Furthermore, and considering that droughts and floods are major water management challenges in both case studies, we focus on the potential of participation to build adaptive capacity. Our analysis of these case studies concludes that influence on public policies is determined more by the context of the participatory process, i.e., legal framework, political leadership, and social awareness, whereas influence on adaptive capacity building depends more on the characteristics of the participatory process, particularly the existence of active on-site consultation and deliberation.

Hydro-economic modeling with aquifer–river interactions to guide sustainable basin management

Policymakers in arid and semiarid basins face hard choices on water policies needed for adaptation to climate change. Hydro-economic modeling is a state-of-the art approach that can be used to guide the design and implementation of these policies in basins. A major gap in developments of hydro-economic modeling to date has been the weak integration of physically-based representations of water sources and uses such as the interaction between ground and surface water resources, to inform complex basin scale policy choices. This paper presents an integrated hydro-economic modeling framework to address this gap with application to an important and complex river basin in Spain, the Jucar basin, for the assessment of a range of climate change scenarios and policy choices. Results indicate that in absence of adequate policies protecting water resources and natural ecosystems, water users will strategically deplete reservoirs, aquifers and river flows for short-term adaptation to climate change, disregarding the impacts on the environment and future human activities. These impacts can be addressed by implementing sustainable management policies. However, these policies could have disproportionate costs for some stakeholders groups, and their opposition may undermine attempts at sustainable policy. These tradeoffs among water policy choices are important guides to the design of policies aimed at basin-wide adaptation to climate change.

Managing Water Resources Under Conditions of Scarcity: On Consumers’ Willingness to Pay for Improving Water Supply Infrastructure

Conservation and efficient management of water resources is an essential ingredient for achieving sustainable development. River basins in Southern Europe are suffering from high water stress, while leakages in some areas far surpass recommended levels. This study uses the contingent valuation method in order to assess willingness to pay (WTP) by consumers in the Guadalquivir River basin in Spain for improving urban water supply infrastructure and reducing leakages. On average, individuals would be willing to pay an extra charge on their water bill ranging from €8.23 to €9.65. In addition to the expected positive effect of income on WTP, respondents with negative perceptions of their drinking water quality as well as those most affected by the economic crisis have a lower WTP. Conversely, WTP is higher for men and respondents showing greater commitment to the environment. These results provide policymakers with information that might help them to improve water-pricing policies in a context of severe water scarcity, especially considering the principle of cost recovery introduced by the EU Water Framework Directive in pricing water services.

Application of a water–energy–food nexus framework for the Duero river basin in Spain

This paper proposes a framework for the identification, assessment and analysis of the water–energy–food nexus at a basin scale. This methodology is applied to the Duero river basin in Spain to detect the most important conflicts derived from water, food and energy interdependencies. Some of the most important issues are the limitations posed by rising energy prices for irrigated agriculture due to modernization, limitations to water treatment, and the possible emergence of new water demands for energy by hydraulic fracturing for oil and gas and enhanced bioenergy.

Influence of Olive Oil Mill Waste Amendment on Fate of Oxyfluorfen in Southern Spain Soils

Oxyfluorfen herbicide residues have been previously reported in surface and ground water in the Guadalquivir river basin in Spain. Soil factors and processes (sorption, dissipation, and leaching) influencing the potential offsite transport of oxyfluorfen to surface and ground water were characterized in laboratory experiments for two soils from Southern Spain. The influence of olive‐oil mill waste amendment on the soil processes was also determined. Oxyfluorfen sorption in unamended soils was not significantly affected by soil active components (organic matter and clay fraction). However, a significant increase in soil sorption of the herbicide was observed upon amendment. Laboratory half‐life values for oxyfluorfen in unamended sandy clay loam and silty clay soils at 40% moisture content and 25°C were 29 and 19 days, respectively, and it increased by a factor of four upon amendment. Oxyfluorfen's mobility along soil profile increased with the amendment in leaching studies at 25°C, suggesting that dissolved organic matter of amendment can play an important role enhancing soil vertical movement of the pesticide. The increase in soil adsorption and persistence observed with olive‐oil mill waste amendment can promote its losses by runoff following winter application, whereas vertical movement of oxyfluorfen can be enhanced following spring application when olive‐oil mill waste amendment is also applied.

An alien ectosymbiotic branchiobdellidan (Annelida: Clitellata) adopting exotic crayfish: a biological co-invasion with unpredictable consequences

Invasive alien species present a global threat to biodiversity, particularly where pathogens and symbionts are involved. Branchiobdellidans are clitellate annelids with an obligate ectosymbiotic association primarily on astacoidean crayfish. There are several examples of branchiobdellidan species adopting a geographically exotic host where endemic and exotic crayfishes cohabit the same water body. The first records of a western North American branchiobdellidan, Xironogiton victoriensis, adopting the eastern North American crayfish, Procambarus clarkii, in 2 river basins in Spain provide further evidence of the ectosymbionts’ tolerance to adopt an exotic host. Given worldwide translocations of these and other commercial crayfish species, limnologists and agency managers need to be alert for further introductions of X. victoriensis and other branchiobdellidans. Impacts of these exotic ectosymbionts on habitat and biota at a new location are unknown, as are their consequences on native biodiversity.

Inferring Attribute Non-attendance from Discrete Choice Experiments: Implications for Benefit Transfer

Typical convergent validity tests of benefit transfer based on stated preference data assume that willingness to pay (WTP) estimates have been accurately measured, and that differences in WTP arise from differences in observable and unobservable characteristics between the study and the policy sites. In this paper, we conduct a convergent validity test assuming equality of underlying preferences, but allow for the possibility that transfer errors arise from differences in the way that respondents process information in the preference elicitation tasks. Using data from an identical survey instrument applied to the population of two river basins in Spain, we obtain marginal and total WTP estimates for ecological improvements of water bodies and the corresponding transfer errors across sites. Results of equality constrained latent class (ECLC) models that infer attribute non-attendance (AN-A) are compared to results from mixed logit (MXL) models in WTP space. We find large absolute and relative differences in marginal and total WTP between sites for the MXL models, and significantly reduced transfer errors for the ECLC models. This paper therefore provides further evidence that AN-A can significantly affect environmental values derived from attribute-based stated preference methods and is the first to investigate the implications for benefit transfer.

El papel de los mercados como instrumento para la reasignación del agua en España

La mayor parte de las cuencas hidrográficas de España se encuentra actualmente en una fase de madurez de la economía del agua, caracterizada por una demanda alta y creciente del recurso y una oferta limitada a largo plazo, situación que está provocando el “cierre” de la mayor parte de las cuencas del sur y el este peninsular. Con la introducción de los mercados de agua se ha tratado de paliar los efectos derivados de esta situación, potenciando un uso más eficiente del recurso. En este trabajo se lleva a cabo un análisis de las experiencias de mercado que han tenido lugar en nuestro país desde su implantación. A pesar del escaso número de operaciones registradas, el volumen de agua intercambiado a través de las mismas ha sido relativamente cuantioso, permitiendo solventar parcialmente los problemas asociados a la escasez de recursos hídricos durante el periodo de sequía de los años 2005-2009.

Optimal Management of the Jucar River and Turia River Basins under Uncertain Drought Conditions

This paper presents a methodology to assess the best behavior achievable for a water resources system, and we apply it to the joint system of the Jucar River and Turia River basins in Spain. The resources of the two rivers are used jointly to meet the different water uses within the region, especially urban demands and environmental requirements. The climate change effects in this area are predicted to be particularly severe in this area with great variability in drought patterns. The results are particularly suitable for evaluating the best performance of the system under uncertain conditions.

The application of hydrological planning as a climate change adaptation tool in the Ebro basin

This paper presents an example of how expected climate change effects have been factored into hydrological planning for the Ebro River basin in Spain. Between now and 2030, a 5% reduction in the basin's water resources is foreseen, along with a drop in the hydrographs' snow component and an increase in dry periods. This article explores the several measures to help reduce the basin's vulnerability to climate change as considered in the technical component of the Ebro Basin Hydrological Plan 2010–2015. These adaptation tools include wastewater treatment, control of water intakes, water reuse, agro-environmental measures, modernization of irrigated areas, improvement of urban water supplies, removal of contaminated sediments, improvement of regulation infrastructure to ensure water supply and control inundations, optimization of hydroelectric exploitation, and improvement of drought and flood management.

Development of operating rules for a complex multi-reservoir system by coupling genetic algorithms and network optimization

An alternative procedure for assessment of reservoir Operation Rules (ORs) under drought situations is proposed. The definition of ORs for multi-reservoir water resources systems (WRSs) is a topic that has been widely studied by means of optimization and simulation techniques. A traditional approach is to link optimization methods with simulation models. Thus the objective here is to obtain drought ORs for a real and complex WRS: the Júcar River basin in Spain, in which one of the main issues is the resource allocation among agricultural demands in periods of drought. To deal with this problem, a method based on the combined use of genetic algorithms (GA) and network flow optimization (NFO) is presented. The GA used was PIKAIA, which has previously been used in other water resources related fields. This algorithm was linked to the SIMGES simulation model, a part of the AQUATOOL decision support system (DSS). Several tests were developed for defining the parameters of the GA. The optimization of various ORs was analysed with the objective of minimizing short-term and long-term water deficits. The results show that simple ORs produce similar results to more sophisticated ones. The usefulness of this approach in the assessment of ORs for complex multi-reservoir systems is demonstrated. Citation Lerma, N., Paredes-Arquiola, J., Andreu, J., and Solera, A., 2013. Development of operating rules for a complex multi-reservoir system by coupling genetic algorithms and network optimization. Hydrological Sciences Journal, 58 (4), 797–812.

An adaptive predictive approach for river level forecasting

Efficient flood management requires accurate real-time forecasts to allow early warnings, real-time control of hydraulics structures, or other actions. Commercially available computing tools typically use hydraulic models derived from the numerical approximation of Saint-Venant equations. These tools need powerful computers, accurate knowledge of the riverbed topography, and skilled operators with a not insignificant hydraulic background. This paper presents an alternative approach in which the river basin is modeled as a network of cascade interconnected input–output systems. Each system is modeled by an adaptive predictive expert model, which provides real-time fast and accurate forecasts over a moving prediction horizon. The approach is evaluated using real data from the Ebro river basin in Spain. The main concluded advantages of the new approach are: (1) the formulation is simple with low computational burden; (2) it does not require topographic information on the river waterbeds; (3) the forecast may be performed autonomously.

Reservoir Management in the Duero Basin (Spain): Impact on River Regimes and the Response to Environmental Change

The climatic conditions of the Iberian Peninsula result in an imbalance between water availability and demand, which is largely managed through the many dams that were built during the 20th century. However, dam operations modify the natural functioning of rivers and related subsystems. In this study we investigated the effect of reservoirs on river regimes in the Duero basin, which is one of the largest river basins in Spain. This involved calculation of a modified impoundment ratio index, and assessment of the correlations between monthly inflows and outflows. Water resources in the basin have decreased markedly during the last five decades, so we also studied how patterns of management have adapted to less water availability in the region. A significant correlation was found between the level of impoundment and the alteration of river regimes by dams. The degree of regulation was highly dependent on annual inflows into the reservoir, and consequently alterations to river regimes were more intense during dry years. The basic pattern of flow regulation involved the storage of water during winter and spring in preparation for high water demand in summer, when natural flows are low. A combination of trend and cluster analyses revealed three responses of reservoir managers to decreasing inflows during the study period: (i) for several reservoirs the level of storage was reduced; (ii) for many reservoirs, particularly those for hydropower production, the storages were increased; and (iii) for the remainder the storage levels were maintained by adjusting the outflows to the decreasing inflows. The results suggest the absence of a common approach to reservoir management, and the dominance of other interests over environmental concerns, particularly in the context of hydrological change in the basin.

Ensayo comparativo entre modelos unidimensionales y bidimensionales en la modelización de la rotura de una balsa de materiales sueltos erosionables

The development of more and more potent computers and the recent research in the field of hidroinformatics makes possible the free surface flow modelling in two dimensions caused by earthen dam failures. In this paper, the results obtained by uni-dimensional model (HEC-RAS) and two-dimensional model (CARPA) are compared. The use of the HEC-RAS software assumes the hypothesis of unidimensionality to be true, no infiltration and existence of a minimal initial flow. The comparison is made by analyzing the effect of these hypothesis in the downstream flow hydrographs. The used models reproduce the water discharge generated by a possible failure of dam number 1 of the 5th District of the Segarra-Garrigues Irrigation Project in the Ebro river basin in Spain.

Potential Toxicity of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons and Organochlorine Pesticides in Sediments from the Ebro River Basin in Spain

This study was carried out to estimate the potential toxicity of 8 Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs) and 5 organochlorine pesticides (OCPs) in sediments in the Ebro River Basin (20 sampling points) according to different methodologies. Detection limit (DL) concentrations were used for compounds reported below the DL (worst-case scenario). The majority of PAH concentrations were found to be below their method detection limit. DL concentrations for OCPs were above the threshold values set by one guideline. In such cases, no toxicity assessment was carried out. It should be noted that no sediment is expected to cause adverse effects on the benthic species living in these sediments according to the methodologies applied.

Probabilistic calibration of a distributed hydrological model for flood forecasting

The complexity of distributed hydrological models has led to improvements in calibration methodologies in recent years. There are various manual, automatic and hybrid methods of calibration. Most use a single objective function to calculate estimation errors. The use of multi-objective calibration improves results, since different aspects of the hydrograph may be considered simultaneously. However, the uncertainty of estimates from a hydrological model can only be taken into account by using a probabilistic approach. This paper presents a calibration method of probabilistic nature, based on the determination of probability functions that best characterize different parameters of the model. The method was applied to the Real-time Interactive Basin Simulator (RIBS) distributed hydrological model using the Manzanares River basin in Spain as a case study. The proposed method allows us to consider the uncertainty in the model estimates by obtaining the probability distributions of flows in the flood hydrograph. Citation Mediero, L., Garrote, L. & Martín-Carrasco, F. J. (2011) Probabilistic calibration of a distributed hydrological model for flood forecasting. Hydrol. Sci. J. 56(7), 1129–1149.

Water reclamation and intersectoral water transfer between agriculture and cities – a FAO economic wastewater study

Cost-benefit studies on replacing conventional agricultural water resources with reclaimed water in favour of cities are still rare. Some results of a study under auspices of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) are presented. By means of an illustrative example at Lobregat River basin in Spain, it could be proved that reclaimed water reuse and intersectoral water transfer can result in economic and environmental benefits at the watershed level. The agricultural community faces cost savings in water pumping and fertilising, increases in yields and incomes; the municipality benefits from additional water resources released by farmers. Farmers should be encouraged to participate by implementing adequate economic incentives. Charging farmers with the full cost of water reclamation may discourage farmers from joining water exchange projects. Particularly in regions with water scarcity, investments in reclaimed water reuse and water exchange arrangements usually pay back and are profitable in the long term.

Environmental and Resource Costs Under Water Scarcity Conditions: An Estimation in the Context of the European Water Framework Directive

The European Water Framework Directive (WFD) requires the good ecological status of surface water bodies, which implies the improvement of both their physicochemical condition, as well as their flow and continuity. The WFD prescribes the assessment of environmental and resource costs and benefits associated with implementing these improvements. The recent literature focuses almost exclusively on the assessment of the economic values related to quality aspects. However, in much of southern Europe, fulfilling the WFD goals will greatly depend on maintaining sufficient water flow, as well. This study aims to fill this gap by assessing the non-market value of allocating enough water to the environment to ensure environmental services are sustained when water is scarce. The non-market value of guaranteeing water supply for secondary household uses is also estimated. Using the Guadalquivir River Basin in Spain as a case study, a choice experiment is applied with scenarios characterized by varying water flow levels and accompanying environmental impacts, and a different frequency of household water restrictions. The results show that the population derives significant benefits not only from the direct use of water, but that also holds non-use values related to the ecological status, although the latter has a considerably lower impact on consumer surplus. Additionally, we conclude that the costs of implementing the water saving measures currently included in the Program of Measures seem to be proportionate to its benefits in this case.

Sea, freshwater or saltpans? Foraging ecology of terns to assess mercury inputs in a wetland landscape: The Ebro Delta

The Ebro catchment, the largest river basin in Spain, includes various heavily industrialized areas. Among these is the Flix site, where a chemical plant has been operating since the beginning of the 20th century. This extended operational period, together with the construction of a dam next to the factory around 1960, resulted in the accumulation of large amounts of heavily polluted sediments in the adjacent riverbed, many of which are contaminated by mercury. Pollutants from Flix are carried downstream by the Ebro River to its delta. In order to assess the transfer of mercury to the complex river estuary ecosystem, we studied the ecology of the tern community living there as these birds segregate into a range of habitats. For this purpose, first we used stable isotope analysis (SIA) (δ 34S, δ 13C, δ 15N) of eggs to determine the trophic ecology and habitat partitioning of several tern species (Common, Sandwich, Little, Gull-Billed and Whiskered Tern) breeding sympatrically, in order to link their foraging ecology with habitat types. Next we measured mercury concentrations in eggs to monitor the input of this metal into the diverse habitats. With the exception of the Little Tern, the other terns used a restricted habitat range in the Ebro Delta, as shown by C and S isotopes; the Gull-Billed and Whiskered Tern foraged in freshwater habitats, while the Common and Sandwich Tern used marine habitats. This restricted feeding behavior of the Gull-Billed and Common Tern contrasts with previous reports in other breeding sites. The Little Tern, which showed a wide range of isotopic values, was found to be an opportunistic forager but fed mainly in saltpans, a feeding habitat not reported previously for this species in this area. We found that mercury concentrations are related to foraging habitat and diet, and are unexpectedly higher in species feeding on demersal prey in marine habitats and also higher in birds feeding in saltpans than in those feeding in freshwater habitats. The mercury concentrations found in the Little and Common Tern eggs sampled in “Punta de la Banya” may be sufficiently high to endanger breeding success.

Assessing disproportionate costs to achieve good ecological status of water bodies in a Mediterranean river basin

Water management is becoming increasingly important as the demand for water grows, diversifies, and includes more complex environmental concerns. The Water Framework Directive (WFD) seeks to achieve a good ecological status for all European Community water bodies by 2015. To achieve this objective, economic consideration of water management must be given to all decision-making processes. Exemption (time or level of stringency) from the objectives of the EU Directive can be justified by proving that the cost of implementing measures is disproportionate to the benefits. This paper addresses the issue of disproportionate costs through a cost-benefit analysis (CBA). To predict the costs, the function costs method is used. The quantification of environmental benefits is more complex, because they are not determined by the market. As an alternative to stated preference methods, we use the distance function approach to estimate the environmental benefits of improving water quality. We then apply this methodological approach to a Mediterranean River Basin in Spain. The results show that the achievement of good status could not be rejected based on the criterion of disproportionate costs in this river basin. This paper illustrates that CBA is a useful tool to inform policy and decision making. Furthermore, it is shown that economics, particularly the valuation of environmental benefits, plays a crucial role in fulfilling the environmental objectives of the WFD.