Surface Infiltration Research Articles

Assessing maintenance techniques and in-situ pavement conditions to restore hydraulic function of permeable interlocking concrete pavements

Permeable pavements are increasingly implemented to mitigate the negative hydrologic outcomes associated with impervious surfaces. However, the hydraulic function of permeable pavements is hindered by clogging in their joint openings, and systematic maintenance is needed to ensure hydraulic functionality throughout the design lifespan of these systems. To quantify the effectiveness of various maintenance measures, surface infiltration rates (SIRs) were measured before and after five different maintenance techniques were applied to five permeable interlocking concrete pavements (PICPs) in central Ohio, USA. Three maintenance techniques, the Municipal Cleaning Vehicle (MCV), the Rejuvenater, and a pressure washer and the Rejuvenater performed in series, significantly improved median SIRs from 16 to 26, 5 to 106, and 11 to 37 mm/min, respectively. However, pressure washing alone resulted in no significant difference to PICP SIR (median SIRs increased from 8 to 20 mm/min). Regenerative air street sweeping significantly worsened SIRs when performed during wet weather (median SIRs decreased from 19 to 4 mm/min) but had no significant impact on SIRs during dry weather (median SIRs decreased from 21 to 18 mm/min). This work captured the maintenance effectiveness of two techniques for the first or second time, namely the Rejuvenater and MCV, to investigate their use as a suitable maintenance technique. Further, the maintenance techniques were tested on multiple PICPs, thus the effect of in-situ pavement conditions had on hydraulic improvement via maintenance could be addressed. Differences in general upkeep, traffic, and runoff routed to a PICP affected the depth of clogging below the pavement surface, which forestalled hydraulic improvement. Though shown to improve the SIR of PICP systems, results indicate that the maintenance techniques were not capable of restoring pavement hydraulics to initial conditions. These results demonstrate the need for regular, routine maintenance and topping up of joint aggregate before clogging migrates deeper into the pavement profile.

Nature-Based Solutions for Storm Water Management—Creation of a Green Infrastructure Suitability Map as a Tool for Land-Use Planning at the Municipal Level in the Province of Monza-Brianza (Italy)

Growing and uncontrolled urbanization and climate change (with an associated increase in the frequency of intense meteoric events) have led to a rising number of flooding events in urban areas due to the insufficient capacity of conventional drainage systems. Nature-Based Solutions represent a contribution to addressing these problems through the creation of a multifunctional green infrastructure, both in urban areas and in the countryside. The aim of this work was to develop a methodology to define Green Infrastructure for stormwater management at the municipal level. The methodology is defined on the basis of three phases: the definition of the territorial information needed, the production of base maps, and the production of a Suitability Map. In the first phase, we define the information needed for the identification of non-urbanized areas where rainwater can potentially infiltrate, as well as areas with soil characteristics that can exclude or limit rainwater infiltration. In the second phase, we constructed the following base maps: a “map of green areas”, a “map of natural surface infiltration potential” and a “map of exclusion areas”. In phase 3, starting from the base maps created in phase 2 and using Geographical Information Systems’ (GIS) geoprocessing procedures, the “Green area compatibility map to realize Green Infrastructure”, the “map of areas not suitable for infiltration” and the final “Green Infrastructure Suitability Map” are created. This methodology should help municipal authorities to set up Green Infrastructure Suitability Maps as a tool for land-use planning.

In-situ measurement of surface infiltration in flexible pavements

ABSTRACT The surface pavement infiltration is one of the main routes for the water to enter into a pavement structure. This infiltration must be measured since it produces damage to the pavement surface and the soil layers of the pavement. To measure the surface infiltration rates of pavements, a field infiltrometer was designed and instrumented. Using this equipment, several in-situ tests were conducted on both low and high traffic roads in Mexico. Because most of the water is believed to enter the pavement through the surface cracks, much of the testing is focused on cracked pavement surfaces. Nonetheless, tests were also conducted on uncracked surfaces and on pavements with open-graded asphalt courses to observe the variation of the infiltration rates regarding the type of pavement. To characterise the cracking, a computational program was developed to measure the cracking extension of the testing site using image processing techniques. Lastly, the results of all the in-situ testing were analysed carefully and some remarks about the utility of the equipment are presented.

ISTOPIC COMPOSITION (H, O AND C) OF NATURAL WATERS OF THE NOVOSIBIRSK CITY AGLOMERATION

The paper presents the first data on the regional distribution of the isotopic composition of oxygen and hydrogen in waters, as well as the carbon of water-dissolved carbon dioxide in natural surface and underground infiltration waters of the Novosibirsk urban agglomeration. For the presented sample of samples, the vector of changes in the values of δD and δO in the studied region was obtained from -112 to -126 ‰ and from -14 to -16 ‰, respectively. The water-dissolved carbon dioxide of the studied waters has the expected biogenic genesis, the isotopic composition of carbon (δC from -14.0 to -7.0 ‰) indicates its participation in the processes of silicate-carbonate weathering.

Smart soil grouting using innovative urease-producing bacteria and low cost materials.

Calcium carbonate is a biomineral whose precipitation could be mediated by ureolytic bacteria and contributes in strengthening of sandy soils. The type of bacteria and grade of reagents have significant influence on microbially induced calcite precipitation (MICP). In the present study, factorial experiments based on these two factors were designed to determine their potential on MICP process, taking into consideration the economic advantages while giving quality results as well. For the first time, Alkalibacterium iburiense strain EE1 (GenBank accession no. MF355369.1) is reported for its biogrouting activity. Optimum growth conditions for MICP treatments were pH (9·56±0·021), EC (44·7±0·057mScm-1 ), OD600 (2·04±0·015), NH4 + concentration (487·06±1·021mmoll-1 ), and urease activity (20·0±0·75mmoll-1 urea hydrolysed min-1 ) after 72-h incubation. Statistical analysis comparing the growth in technical-grade medium prepared in tap water and analytical-grade medium prepared in deionized water showed no significant differences (P=1·0) in biomass and urease activity. In contrast to previous studies, the current approach could reduce the bacterial culture and cementation solution ratio by about 50%, using a simple surface percolation method with staged injection instead of parallel injection to treat different sand columns. Using fixation solution could immobilize the bacteria over the full length of columns for better strength improvement. The unconfined compressive strength ranged between 0·64 to 2·11kgcm-2 , and the corresponding CaCO3 contents 5·7-38·5%. The scanning electron microscope images indicated that the precipitated CaCO3 by bacteria was stable calcite. Alkalibacterium iburiense and technical-grade reagents under nonsterile conditions are satisfactory consolidating agents for sandy soils. This approach is considered eco-friendly and cost-effective for future scale-up applications in various geotechnical engineering.

Micromorphology and fractal evaluation of Dinizia excelsa Ducke wood under three different cut conditions by atomic force microscopy

An advanced characterization on the micromorphology of Dinizia excelsa Ducke was performed on the roughly sanded main wood cutting surfaces, longitudinal radial, longitudinal tangential, and transversal. AFM was applied to obtain 3D topographical images. Morphology and its correlated parameters were studied using MountainsMap software, according to the ISO 25178-2: 2012. Advanced fractal parameters, explicitly, fractal dimension, fractal succolarity, fractal lacunarity, and surface entropy, were obtained and analyzed. Each plan has a unique morphology, and the most significant roughness occurred to the tangential surface. All plans exposed similar asymmetry and kurtosis. Microtextures were similar, although the tangential surface exhibited the least spatial complexity. The fractal parameters H and β confirmed the microtexture similarity, revealing all the surfaces have similar topographic uniformity and textures. Fractal succolarity showed that the surface percolation was significantly different. These results indicate the mathematical tools applied to topographical AFM images can map the wood surface spatial patterns.

Analyzing the surface dynamics of titanium thin films using fractal and multifractal geometry

Titanium thin films are prepared by DC magnetron sputtering on the glass substrate with varying sputtering power. The nanoscale surface morphology and nanotexture are captured via atomic force microscopy (AFM). The value of average roughness and interface width show the increasing trend with sputtering power. The autocorrelation and height-height correlation function are applied to characterize the formation of the self-affine and mounded surfaces. The roughness (or Hurst) exponent and fractal dimension are estimated by height-height correlation function while lateral correlation length is measured by autocorrelation. It is found that the surface complexity is affected with various sputtering power. The value of Hurst exponent of the topography greater than 0.5 indicates a persistent behavior and such system shows memory effect. The fractal lacunarity, succolarity and surface entropy is used for investigating the surface microtexture and percolation. The 2D Multifractal Detrended Fluctuation Analysis (2D MFDFA) method is used to study the multifractal nature of thin-film surfaces. Computed Δα and Δf show an increase with sputtering power indicating a surface with many characteristic scale patterns. Furthermore, the thin film deposited with the highest sputtering power has greater topographic uniformity, lower surface percolation and greater homogeneity of the surface microtexture.

Fractal-Stereometric Correlation of Nanoscale Spatial Patterns of GdMnO3 Thin Films Deposited by Spin Coating

Multiferroic systems are of great interest for technological applications. To improve the fabrication of thin films, stereometric and fractal analysis of surface morphology have been extensively performed to understand the influence of physical parameters on the quality of spatial patterns. In this work, GaMnO3 was synthesized and thin films were deposited on Pt(111)/TiO2/SiO2/Si substrates using a spin coating apparatus to study the correlation between their stereometric and fractal parameters. All films were studied by X-ray diffraction (XRD), where the structure and microstructure of the film sintered at 850 °C was investigated by Rietveld refinement. Topographic maps of the films were obtained using an atomic force microscope (AFM) in tapping mode. The results show that the film sintered at 850 °C exhibited a clear formation of a GdMnO3 orthorhombic structure with crystallite size of ~14 nm and a microstrain higher than other values reported in the literature. Its surface morphology presented a rougher topography, which was confirmed by the height parameters. Topographic differences due to different asymmetries and shapes of the height distributions between the films were observed. Specific stereometric parameters also showed differences in the morphology and microtexture of the films. Qualitative rendering obtained by commercial image processing software revealed substantial differences between the microtextures of the films. Fractal and advanced fractal parameters showed that the film sintered at 850 °C had greater spatial complexity, which was due to their higher topographic roughness, lower surface percolation and greater topographic uniformity, being dominated by low dominant special frequencies. Our combination of stereometric and fractal measurements can be useful to improve the fabrication process by optimizing spatial patterns as a function of the sintering temperature of the film.

A unified approach for analysing surface flow and groundwater induced slope instability

ABSTRACT The combined effects of transient, surface and subsurface flows and infiltration govern the rainfall-induced potential failure of unsaturated soil slopes stabilised by matric suction. In this paper, it is shown how fundamental fluid dynamics can be employed to closely model the above flow effects than the empirical Richard’s approach. The fluid dynamics-based Navier-Stokes formulation also facilitates the integration of the three modes of flow: (1) surface, (2) subsurface and (3) infiltration water flows, into a unified analytical model. Therefore, in contrast to previous studies, this fundamental approach can seamlessly incorporate the effects of continuous interplay between surface and subsurface water flows and the inertial terms of flow on the reduction of matric suction in unsaturated soils. Transient flow effects have been combined with geomechanics of unsaturated soil to demonstrate their impact on the stability of an embankment under a more realistic non-uniform rainfall. The innovative use of the laboratory-evaluated soil properties such as the hydraulic conductivity and porosity to express the drag force in the Navier-Stokes equations facilitates the examination of the sensitivity of slope stability to the relevant soil classification parameters.

Spatial Distribution of CaCO3 in Biocemented Sandy Slope Using Surface Percolation

AbstractThe microbial-induced carbonate precipitation (MICP) technique has been increasingly employed for erosion mitigation and stabilization of sandy slopes. Biocementation can improve the streng...

Understanding China’s Urban Rainstorm Waterlogging and Its Potential Governance

Urban rainstorm waterlogging is one of the most important problems in urban development and a comprehensive embodiment of urban diseases. China is facing a severe risk of rainstorm waterlogging disasters, which is affecting sustainable development. Urban rainstorm waterlogging in China is caused by many factors, including natural factors and human factors, such as climate warming, unreasonable urban construction, inadequate upgrading of urban fortification standards, etc. Based on the analysis of the current strategies to deal with urban waterlogging around the world, including an increase in surface infiltration, and a reduction in runoff (and its various impacts), this paper holds that the connotation and goal of these measures are highly consistent with the construction of a sponge city in China. Based on the analysis of the problems, including construction of an urban rainwater recovery system, construction of urban rainwater storage facilities, and construction of data platforms faced by China’s sponge city, this paper puts forward the guiding principles of promoting the construction of a sponge city. The guiding principles are to cooperate to deal with climate change and ecological civilization construction, to study the foreign experience, and to unite multiple subjects, integrate multiple elements, design multiple processes, form a joint force, and create an all-round response system to deal with urban rainstorm waterlogging. Then, this paper gives policy recommendations on how to deal with the urban rainstorm waterlogging disasters, which include improving the defense standards, encouraging social participation, popularizing the construction of sponge cities, perfecting the monitoring and early warning system, strengthening the scientific planning of cities, strengthening the ability of dealing with catastrophes in metropolitan areas, the overall planning of cross-regional responses, and enhancing the awareness of decision makers. Finally, this paper expounds the reference significance of urban rainstorm waterlogging control in China to the global audience. This paper explores the significance of comprehensively and scientifically understanding urban rainstorm waterlogging disasters, and provides support for long-term planning and high-quality construction of future safe cities.

Analysis of Flooding Adaptation and Groundwater Recharge After Adopting JW Ecological Technology in a Highly Developed Urbanization Area

The relationship between Taiwan’s groundwater resources recharge strategy and flood disasters is significant. The adaptation strategies of traditional urbanization areas simulate the spatial distribution of permeable pavements under different rainfall intensities that affect surface runoff and infiltration. Since there are many parameters of the Stormwater Management Model set in different low-impact development modules, this study refers to transform the inundation to groundwater recharge. In this study, we simulated the spatial distribution multi-advantages of the JW ecological technology under short-duration intense rainfall events. The results show that the application of JW ecological technology can effectively increase groundwater resources by 64.1% through infiltration and reduce economic losses by about NTD 1.25 million under the rainfall event of 112 mm/1 h. The infiltration replenishment amount was about 61%, which could reduce the economic loss of NTD 4.4 million under the rainfall event of 350 mm/6 h. Thus, applying JW ecological technology in a highly developed urbanization area can effectively reduce surface runoff and economic losses. At the same time, the issue of water resources was adapted by the groundwater recharge.

Assessing wetland functionality using soil surface indicators in Letšeng- la-Letsie wetland in Quthing District, Lesotho

Wetlands are globally valuable ecosystems as they provide many important services to the human society, yet the ecology of some of them is yet to be understood. This study assessed the functionality of Letšeng-la-Letsie wetland in Lesotho, using the Landscape Function Analysis (LFA) technique and soil quality indicators. LFA threshold values for stability, infiltration and nutrient cycling were found to be >50%, >30% and >20%, respectively, whereas the mean surface stability, infiltration and nutrient cycling were 55.4 ± 1.9%, 28 ± 1.9%, and 15.5 ± 2% respectively. Although soil cover was high, the soil was unstable with low litter and low cryptogam cover. These rendered the soil less fertile, resulting in lower primary plant productivity and nutrient cycling potential. The three LFA indices were correlated with soil quality indicators, including pH, carbon, nitrogen, soil texture, calcium, magnesium, sodium, potassium, cation exchange capacity and phosphorus. Clay content and CEC had a significant (p < 0.05) negative correlation with the LFA indices and soil organic carbon. Redundancy analysis showed that stability was positively correlated to soil carbon and potassium. Monitoring of this wetland ecosystem is deemed necessary for the early warning of possible landscape degradation, as a result of induced pressures on the ecosystem.

Assessment of water infiltration of urban surface based on remote sensing: a case study of Wuhan, China

Assessment of water infiltration of the urban surface is the prerequisite and basis when we study the impact of urbanization on the urban ecological environment such as stormwater runoff and the heat island effect. However, few studies have been done on how to make such an assessment. In this paper, a detailed assessment of water infiltration of urban surface for Wuhan, China was conducted based on remote sensing. Classification of land-use types and their water infiltration criterion was proposed by the V-I-S (Vegetation-Impervious Surface-Soil) model. The Landsat-8 remote sensing data were used to classify various land-use types in Wuhan. The water infiltration capacity distribution in Wuhan was then obtained and classified into five levels. These results will also be helpful to provide a basis for establishing a comprehensive water infiltration model of the urban surface in the future.

Analysis of infiltration and surface runoff using rainfall simulator with variation of rain intensity and vegetation

Changes in watershed land use are a concern due to the increase of flood from year to year which can harm the community both material and non-material. Meanwhile, during the dry season there was a significant decrease and causes irrigation water supply and clean water for daily needs to decrease and even to dry. Surface runoff and infiltration in a watershed area becomes an inseparable unit, with increasing surface runoff causing big flooding, flash floods and reducing infiltration, causing less groundwater supply to maintain river availability tend to decrease. The testing of vegetation effect on watershed areas on surface runoff and infiltration with a rainfall simulator was to analyze the extent of the role of vegetation in rainfall intensity with surface runoff and infiltration on rainfall intensity. Tests were carried out using a rain fall simulator using intensities I2 and I5 on two types of vegetation selected at the location of Maros watershed, namely mango and bamboo vegetation. The results show that changes in land cover increase surface runoff and reduce infiltration. So that land use should not be carried out carelessly and still have to pay attention to the sustainability of the function of the forest as river water retention. Land damage will be responded to by unexpected flooding and disruption of the land ecosystem, causing the extinction of flora and fauna habitat to become an indicator of increasingly critical land damage.

Drinking-water Quality Risk Assessment Based on Parameters with Organoleptic (Taste and Odor) Effects Observed in Water from Surface Water Intake and Infiltration Water Intake Facilities

Risks of organoleptic (taste and odor) effects in drinking water from three water intake facilities are assessed, and research results are presented. The highest risk values for water hardness were identified in samples from infiltration water intake; the value for color-related risks was constant and equal to 0.001. For surface water intake samples, the values of water hardness and associated organoleptic risk are the lowest, compared to other water intakes, and do not exceed 0.008. Risk values of organoleptic effects associated with color at the surface water intake facilities are within the range of 0.001-0.003. The risk values for the taste, and odor effects due to turbidity are constant for all water intakes and equal to 0.002. There is no risk of developing organoleptic-olfactory products associated with the chemical oxygen demand parameter in all samples. The research shows that the overall values of the organoleptic risks are the highest in instances form infiltration water intakes compared with the surface water intake. In addition, the water hardness parameter contributes the most to overall organoleptic risks for all water intakes. The authors conclude that the risks associated with organoleptic (taste and odor) effects do not exceed an acceptable level, both for each indicator considered separately and for their combined effect.

Management of Urban Stormwater at Block-Level (MUST-B): A New Approach for Potential Analysis of Decentralized Stormwater Management Systems

Cities worldwide are facing problems to mitigate the impact of urban stormwater runoff caused by the increasing occurrence of heavy rainfall events and urban re-densification. This study presents a new approach for estimating the potential of the Management of Urban STormwater at Block-level (MUST-B) by decentralized blue-green infrastructures here called low-impact developments (LIDs) for already existing urban environments. The MUST-B method was applied to a study area in the northern part of the City of Leipzig, Germany. The Study areas was divided into blocks smallest functional units and considering two different soil permeability and three different rainfall events, seven scenarios have been developed: current situation, surface infiltration, swale infiltration, trench infiltration, trough-trench infiltration, and three different combinations of extensive roof greening, trough-trench infiltration, and shaft infiltration. The LIDs have been simulated and their maximum retention/infiltration potential and the required area have been estimated together with a cost calculation. The results showed that even stormwater of a 100 year rainfall event can be fully retained and infiltrated within the blocks on a soil with low permeability (kf = 10−6 m/s). The cost and the required area for the LIDs differed depending on the scenario and responded to the soil permeability and rainfall events. It is shown that the MUST-B method allows a simple down- and up-scaling process for different urban settings and facilitates decision making for implementing decentralized blue-green-infrastructure that retain, store, and infiltrate stormwater at block level.

Influence of multiple treatment cycles on the strength and microstructure of biocemented sandy soil

The strength of sandy soil can be improved via enzyme-induced calcium carbonate (CaCO3) precipitation (EICP). This method is a sustainable and environmentally friendly soil improvement technique that forms calcium carbonate between and around the soil particles. The formation of CaCO3 is achieved through the hydrolysis of urea that is catalyzed by free enzyme urease. This paper is divided into two parts. The first part explains the test-tube tests that were conducted to determine the amount and efficiency of CaCO3 precipitation at different concentrations of the cementation reagent (CCR). The second part describes the effects of multiple treatment cycles on the unconfined compressive strength (UCS) of EICP-treated soil. The soil samples were mixed with the EICP solution and compacted into PVC moulds. It was then followed by cycles of treatment with the EICP solution via surface percolation. The effectiveness of the bio-cementation was determined through a series of UCS tests. The results revealed that the UCS increased with higher CCR and more treatment cycles. The increase in UCS was also attributed to higher amounts of CaCO3 precipitated within the soil matrix. The highest UCS value of 1712 kPa was obtained at 1 M after the 3rd cycle of treatment with 8.21% CaCO3content. In conclusion, a higher number of treatment cycles demonstrated that increased deposition of CaCO3 precipitates increases the bonding effects and strength of the treated soil. Successful use of EICP in soil improvement will help in reducing sustainability concerns related to the production of conventional stabilizers such as cement.

Identifying the risk of urban nonpoint source pollution using an index model based on impervious-pervious spatial pattern

Abstract Efficiently evaluating the risk of urban non-point source pollution (urban-NPS) using only a few parameters is crucial to its management and control, especially in engineering. However, the huge spatial heterogeneity of urban-NPS induced by the high spatial heterogeneity in land use, surface infiltration and surface micro-topography, make it difficult. A new index model composed of transport and source factors was proposed to evaluate the urban-NPS risk. An urban catchment in southern China served to demonstrate the proposed method. The ability of runoff output was characterized by the transport factor in which the impervious-pervious surface spatial pattern, imperviousness ratio and rainfall were taken into account. The pollutants output capacity was represented by source factor where the imperviousness ratio and source-sink transformation resulting from rainfall were considered. Results show the proposed index can identify and evaluate the risk of urban-NPS at both urban parcel scale and catchment scale. The percent bias (PBIAS) of runoff volume helped to assess the performance of the index. PBIAS (1–86%) between the proposed method and the observed runoff was much lower than that (27–448%) between the traditional runoff coefficient method and the observed runoff. These suggest that the proposed index offers a new way of assessing urban-NPS risk.

The simplified design method of permeable pavement system for urban catchment

Climate change increases the probability of extreme rainfall events, which results in large-scale flooding in urban areas. Yet, urban areas are often too crowded to build flood detention facilities. To cope with this issue, this study developed a simplified design method of a permeable pavement system. Firstly, the detention volume calculation method for the underground detention pond was established. Secondly, a novel permeable pavement system named JW pavement was used as an example to verify the feasibility of the development method for the underground detention pond. Thirdly, the surface infiltration rate and the void ratio of a gravel layer were measured. Finally, the equation of the thickness required for the gravel layer was established based on the requirement of flood detention volume. To sum up, the thicker a gravel layer is, the more capable a gravel layer is to protect the city from flooding. The urban flood can be reduced by the combination of a high surface infiltration rate permeable pavement system and a thick underground detention pond.