Industrial Water Use Research Articles

Retraction Note to: Groundwater level change based on edge computing and translation accuracy of urban English

For China, water resources are very scarce, mainly because of the rapid economic development. Especially in the north of China, in order to meet the needs of local social development, groundwater in North China has been overfished for many years, resulting in serious environmental problems. The plain area of S city is a typical groundwater overfishing area in North China Plain. Long-term overexploitation of groundwater disturbs the balance between recharge and drainage. The groundwater level in the plain of S city decreased rapidly, forming a large number of groundwater depression funnels in this area. In the past few decades, the scale of groundwater drawdown funnel has been expanding, causing geological and ecological problems such as cracks and collapses. In view of the fact that the groundwater level in S city has been declining and the scope of groundwater depression funnel has been continuously extended, comprehensive management has been implemented. Two governance methods can be used through edge computing. First, we should speed up the construction of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project and use the river water allocated by the South-to-North Water Diversion Project to replace the groundwater extracted from the receiving area. The second is underground water pressure mining. Control the intensity of water extraction, improve the efficiency of industrial and agricultural water use, and reduce the use of groundwater. On the basis of the analysis of language and usage standards, combined with examples, we can take the city English of Los Angeles as a reference, expand the analysis of language use and social pragmatics, and check the mistranslation of Chinese city English, so as to improve the accuracy of translation. Based on the study of groundwater level change and the accuracy of urban English translation, this paper applies it to edge computing, which promotes the development of groundwater treatment and urban English translation.

A novel user-friendly tool for minimizing water use in processing industry

This article proposes a user-friendly tool for investigating water reuse and reduction strategies within the processing industry. The tool is based on a new, simple approach to targeting minimum freshwater systems with single or multiple contaminants. This method can be applied to the processing industry in general and in particular the food industry, which presents significant challenges for water-saving. The investigation of water recovery is suitable for the new design or revamping of the water network of continuous processes. According to the water quality requirement, the options for water reuse are limited. Each operation using water involves an inevitable transfer of pollutants, which increases the concentrations in the water flow. By promoting the reuse options, the freshwater decreases, but the contaminant concentrations increase further. The optimum design targets result from a tradeoff between the maximum water reuse, the maximum possible concentrations of contaminants, and the minimum mass transfer of pollutants involved within each operation. An algorithmic procedure for tradeoffs is developed and implemented in Python software language. One case study is used to demonstrate this targeting method.

Economic and Sustainability Inequalities and Water Consumption of European Union Countries

Water scarcity is becoming a global concern for many reasons as its consumption increases. This research aimed to analyze sustainability inequalities in the water consumption of EU countries. Descriptive statistics using data for four AQUASTAT periods (2002, 2007, 2012, and 2017), and quotients for the AQUASTAT 2017 period, were calculated using a proposed econometric model. The main results were that countries with high GPD and population showed high water stress and total water withdrawal. Countries with lower industry-value-added-to-GDP quotients were among those with higher industrial water use efficiency, while low water-services-use-efficiency quotients were associated with high services value added to GDP. Suggestions for policymakers are provided and formula application guidelines for regional-level comparisons are described.

Spatial Variations in Terrestrial Water Storage with Variable Forces across the Yellow River Basin

Terrestrial water storage (TWS) variations are a result of the interconnected impact of various variables including climate, hydrology, ecology, and anthropogenic activities. Previous studies have indicated that climate factors (e.g., precipitation and potential evapotranspiration), vegetation restoration, and water withdrawals (irrigational and industrial water use) are the major determinants of TWS depletion across the Yellow River Basin (YRB). However, few studies have provided explicit information about the main forcing variables that determine spatiotemporal variations in TWS and the synergies among these factors. This study explored the explicit understanding of hydro-climatic and socio-ecological determinants and the key interacting processes that affected the TWS variations across the Yellow River Basin in northern China. The multivariate adaptive regression splines model was employed to establish the relationship function of the long-term trends for the dependent (TWS) and independent (explanatory) variables consisting of normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), hydro-climate, and human water withdrawal. The long-term trends estimated from the MARS model reproduced the ones calculated by Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment gravity satellites, with a determination coefficient (R2) of 0.83 and a mean absolute error (MAE) of 1.2 mm. The results showed that precipitation, minimum temperature, runoff, base flow, water withdrawal for electricity, and NDVI were the main drivers of the spatiotemporal variations in the TWS, of which minimum temperature and runoff played a considerable role in TWS variations through the interplay with other variables. The critical values of the trend for interactive variables, which could alter the acting direction of the synergy on the TWS, were also estimated. In view of the connotation of interactive variables, we suggested that spatiotemporal variations in TWS resulted from the coupling of the hydrological energy system, hydrological ecosystem, and hydrological system in the YRB, of which the hydrological system plays the most significant role, followed by the hydrological ecosystem.

Optimal Multi-Sectoral Water Resources Allocation Based on Economic Evaluation Considering the Environmental Flow Requirements: A Case Study of Yellow River Basin

Competitions and disputes between various human water sectors and environmental flow of the river are exacerbated due to the rapid growth of the economy in Yellow River basin as well as the limited supply of available water resources in recent decades. It is necessary to implement rational and effective management and allocation to alleviate the pressure of water shortage. In order to promote economic development and maintain the ecological balance of the river, both the water allocation to the river environmental system and different human needs should be of concern when making the allocation polices. This study developed a water allocation model based on Nash–Harsanyi bargaining game theory for optimal water resources allocation among agricultural, industrial, domestic, public, and urban ecological water (watering for urban green space) sectors while ensuring the environmental flow requirements of lower reaches. A comprehensive economic evaluation framework is built to assess the economic benefits of different water uses that were taken as the basis of water allocation model. The annual environmental base flow is 7.50 billion m3 in the lower reaches of Yellow River. Moreover, the optimal annual allocations for agricultural, industrial, domestic, public, and urban ecological water use sectors are estimated as 33.7, 6.42, 3.96, 1.75 and 2.68 billion m3, respectively.

RETRACTED ARTICLE: Groundwater level change based on edge computing and translation accuracy of urban English

For China, water resources are very scarce, mainly because of the rapid economic development. Especially in the north of China, in order to meet the needs of local social development, groundwater in North China has been overfished for many years, resulting in serious environmental problems. The plain area of S city is a typical groundwater overfishing area in North China Plain. Long-term overexploitation of groundwater disturbs the balance between recharge and drainage. The groundwater level in the plain of S city decreased rapidly, forming a large number of groundwater depression funnels in this area. In the past few decades, the scale of groundwater drawdown funnel has been expanding, causing geological and ecological problems such as cracks and collapses. In view of the fact that the groundwater level in S city has been declining and the scope of groundwater depression funnel has been continuously extended, comprehensive management has been implemented. Two governance methods can be used through edge computing. First, we should speed up the construction of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project and use the river water allocated by the South-to-North Water Diversion Project to replace the groundwater extracted from the receiving area. The second is underground water pressure mining. Control the intensity of water extraction, improve the efficiency of industrial and agricultural water use, and reduce the use of groundwater. On the basis of the analysis of language and usage standards, combined with examples, we can take the city English of Los Angeles as a reference, expand the analysis of language use and social pragmatics, and check the mistranslation of Chinese city English, so as to improve the accuracy of translation. Based on the study of groundwater level change and the accuracy of urban English translation, this paper applies it to edge computing, which promotes the development of groundwater treatment and urban English translation.

Silica Removal from a Paper Mill Effluent by Adsorption on Pseudoboehmite and γ-Al2O3

Effluent reuse is a common practice for sustainable industrial water use. Salt removal is usually carried out by a combination of membrane processes with a final reverse osmosis (RO). However, the presence of silica limits the RO efficiency due to its high scaling potential and the difficulty of cleaning the fouled membranes. Silica adsorption has many advantages compared to coagulation and precipitation at high pHs: pH adjustment is not necessary, the conductivity of treated waters is not increased, and there is no sludge generation. Therefore, this study investigates the feasibility of using pseudoboehmite and its calcination product (γ-Al2O3) for silica adsorption from a paper mill effluent. The effect of sorbent dosage, pH, and temperature, including both equilibrium and kinetics studies, were studied. γ-Al2O3 was clearly more efficient than pseudoboehmite, with optimal dosages around 2.5–5 g/L vs. 7.5–15 g/L. The optimum pH is around 8.5–10, which fits well with the initial pH of the effluent. The kinetics of silica adsorption is fast, especially at high dosages and temperatures: 80–90% of the removable silica is removed in 1 h. At these conditions, silica removal is around 75–85% (<50 mg/L SiO2 in the treated water).

Supply-demand risk assessment and multi-scenario simulation of regional water-energy-food nexus: A case study of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region

The risks associated with water-energy-food (WEF) nexus can be determined by analyzing the three resources as a system and subsequently measuring the probability of resource shortages in this system under the influences of external factors such as climate, economy, and society. In this study, a Bayesian network (BN) model was used to construct the supply-demand risk assessment framework, identify the risk factors during different periods in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (BTH) region, and simulate the probability of supply-demand risk under different scenarios. The results showed that (1) the WEF supply-demand risk in the BTH region originated from not only core system factors, but also from external system factors. (2) The factors affecting the WEF supply-demand risk varied significantly over time. In the tortuous development stage (1989–1998), industrial and agricultural water use intensity were highly important. In the rapid development stage (1999–2008), the population growth rate became the main factor. In the coordinated development stage (2009–2018), the water and food supply-demand risks became increasingly important. (3) In scenarios where representative climate-economy-society factors (rainfall, gross domestic product, and population) were in high-high-high, medium-high-high, low-medium-high, and low-high-high, respectively, the probability of WEF supply-demand risk increased significantly. This probability was effectively reduced in medium-low-low, medium-medium-low, and medium-high-low scenarios. Using BN to study the WEF supply-demand risk allows for an intuitive understanding of the interaction mechanisms among variables in the WEF nexus. This approach also enables the design of more realistic scenarios, thus providing a reference for the formulation of early risk warning mechanisms.

An assessment and prognosis of water resources use in regions of the transboundary basin of the Ural River in the medium term

An assessment and medium-term prognosis of water resources use in the transboundary basin of the Ural River, and adjacent regions of the Russian Federation and the Republic of Kazakhstan were represented in the paper. Prediction of water consumption is one of the most significant water resources management tasks in the transboundary river basins. Under a water deficit of water resources in the Ural River basin in hydrological droughts, data on prospective water consumption allows estimating possible problems of regular water use and ways of their solution for neighboring states. Data on the dynamics of water consumption from 1995 to 2019 and materials of prognoses for socio-economic development of the region in the medium term were used to research and calculate expected water use values. Based on statistical methods, taking into account parameters scheduled of the dynamics of the population and economic development in the regions, we calculated prospective volumes of water resources use in the Ural River basin areas. Projection of water resources’ use is represented in several scenarios following prognoses of socio-economic development in the regions. As a result, the structural forecasts were worked out according to a type of water consumption: domestic and utility, industrial, irrigation, and agricultural water use for each region of neighboring countries by 2024.

Analysis on regional differences of water use efficiency rigid constraints and countermeasures in Zhejiang Province

With the implementation of the most stringent water resources management system, rigid constraints on water resources have gradually increased, the total amount of water used has been effectively controlled. In order to quantify the strength of rigid constraints on water resources, the concept of rigid constraints on water efficiency was proposed, and the constraints on industrial and agricultural water efficiency targets and regional differences in 11 districted cities in Zhejiang Province were analyzed, and the target constraints in the industrial and agricultural water use were comprehensively considered through scenario analysis. Seven types of areas, including industrial and agricultural strong control, agricultural main control, and industrial main control are drawn, and countermeasures for optimizing water resources and water-saving management for different types of areas are put forward to further improve the level of water resources management in Zhejiang Province.

Study on water resources consumption and environmental pollution of China's provinces under different economic development levels

AbstractIn China, the contradiction between rapid economic development and water shortage has attracted much attention. This paper explores the problems of water consumption and environmental pollution in provinces with different economic development levels in China. Sewage discharge is put into the undesirable meta frontier dynamic data envelopment analysis (DEA) model as an undesirable output variable. The water use efficiency under different income levels from 2013 to 2017 is compared at the provincial level from the perspective of domestic water use efficiency, ecological water use efficiency, industrial water use efficiency and agricultural water use efficiency, and the dynamic evolution is further revealed by using kernel density estimation. The results show that water resource utilisation efficiency is positively correlated with regional income level and economic development level. The internal differences in high‐income areas are narrowing, while the internal differences in middle‐income areas are significantly expanding; agricultural water use efficiency is the most prominent problem. In view of these situations, the total amount and intensity of water consumption should be controlled in high‐income areas. For middle‐income provinces with abundant water resources but low efficiency, local governments can strengthen legislation and supervision.

Sustainable remediation solution for heavy metal contaminated soils of Pakistan: A review

The heavy metals are recognized as major threat to the agricultural land. Most of these heavy metals enter in soil due to anthropogenic sources including rapid urbanization, industrialization, excessive use of pesticides, herbicides and fertilizers, mining and smelting activities and electronic wastes etc. The complexity of soil-heavy metal interaction is also increased due to inefficient sewage systems, use of industrial water for irrigation purposes without proper treatment. The translocation of H.M.s from Soil to the vegetative parts and accumulation in vegetative parts of the plants and humans has become an emerging threat to human health. Several physical, chemical, and biological techniques are being practiced for the remediation of heavy metals contaminated soils in Pakistan. However, in developing countries like Pakistan, high costs of equipment, energy supply, operation and maintenance limits their applicability and sustainability. On the other hand, Phytoremediation is a cost-effective technique which relies on solar energy to boost up the process with minimum technical, operational and maintenance cost. Finally, the disposal of contaminated plants used in Phytoremediation can be achieved through different procedures like incineration, compacting, pyrolysis, leaching depending upon the availability of resources and type of plants. The cost-benefit analysis reveals that cost highly varies depending upon a number of factors and the minimum estimated cost ranging from $10-35. The hyperaccumulator plants provide a reasonable solution for heavy metal contaminated lands with less cost and limitations as compared to the other techniques. Keywords: Bioaccumulation; Contamination; Cost-benefit analysis; Phytoremediation; Pollution http://dx.doi.org/10.19045/bspab.2021.100051

Distributed memory parallel groundwater modeling for the Netherlands Hydrological Instrument

Worldwide, billions of people rely on fresh groundwater reserves for their domestic, agricultural and industrial water use. Extreme droughts and excessive groundwater pumping put pressure on water authorities in maintaining sustainable water usage. High-resolution integrated models are valuable assets in supporting them. The Netherlands Hydrological Instrument (NHI) provides the Dutch water authorities with open source modeling software and data. However, NHI integrated groundwater models often require long run times and large memory usage, therefore strongly limiting their application. As a solution, we present a distributed memory parallelization, focusing on the National Hydrological Model. Depending on the level of integration, we show that significant speedups can be obtained up to two orders of magnitude. As far as we know, this is the first reported integrated groundwater parallelization of an operational hydrological model used for national-scale integrated water management and policy making. The parallel model code and data are freely available.

Characterization of Municipal Water Uses in the Contiguous United States

AbstractThis study investigates municipal water use patterns across the Contiguous United States (CONUS). The objectives of this study are to explore temporal trends in water use, improve characterization of indoor and outdoor uses, and improve characterization of commercial, industrial, and institutional (CII) water use in cities across the CONUS. A comprehensive survey was conducted to compile monthly water use data from 126 municipalities for the period 2005–2017 with specific information about residential and CII water use categories. Changes in liters per capita per day and the CII to Residential water use ratio were related to climatic, urban‐geologic and socio‐economic variables. Results indicate an overall decreasing trend in municipal water uses with higher reductions achieved in residential sector. Both residential and CII water use exhibit high seasonality over an average year. The CII to Residential ratio increases with city population and is highest in cities in the Northeast Census region. Cities in South and West Census regions have high municipal water uses and highest reductions in annual per capita‐day water use. Cities in arid climate regions have the highest water uses, compared to other cities, due to landscape irrigation. April precipitation, annual vapor pressure deficit, number of employees in the manufacturing (or, other services except public administration) sector, total percentage of houses built before 1950 and total percentage of single‐family houses explain much of the variation in CII to Residential water use ratio across the CONUS. This study guides improved characterization of municipal water uses and water demand management strategies.

Forecast and uncertainty analysis of extreme precipitation in China from ensemble of multiple climate models

Global climate change is expected to have a major impact on the hydrological cycle. Understanding potential changes in future extreme precipitation is important to the planning of industrial and agricultural water use, flood control, and ecological environment protection. In this paper, we study the statistical distribution of extreme precipitation based on historical observation and various global climate models (GCMs), and predict the expected change and the associated uncertainty. The empirical frequency, generalized extreme value (GEV) distribution, and L-moment estimator algorithms are used to establish the statistical distribution relationships and the multi-model ensemble predictions are established by the Bayesian model averaging (BMA) method. This ensemble forecast takes advantage of multi-model synthesis, which is an effective measure to reduce the uncertainty of model selection in extreme precipitation forecasting. We have analyzed the relationships among extreme precipitation, return period, and precipitation durations for 6 representative cities in China. More significantly, the approach allows for establishing the uncertainty of extreme precipitation predictions. The empirical frequency from the historical data is all within the 90% confidence interval of the BMA ensemble. For the future predictions, the extreme precipitation intensities of various durations tend to become larger compared to the historic results. The extreme precipitation under the RCP8.5 scenario is greater than that under the RCP2.6 scenario. The developed approach not only effectively gives the extreme precipitation predictions, but also can be used to any other extreme hydrological events in future climate.

An Improved Inexact Two-Stage Stochastic with Downside Risk-Control Programming Model for Water Resource Allocation under the Dual Constraints of Water Pollution and Water Scarcity in Northern China

Water resource allocation aimed at sustainable watershed development suffers from prominent challenges such as water pollution and scarcity, especially in water-deprived regions. Based on analysis of water quality, use, and sectoral demands during the planning period in the Fenhe River Basin, an improved inexact two-stage stochastic programming model with downside risk control was built for optimal resource allocations for the four primary sectors (industry, domestic use, agriculture, and the environment) in the basin. The principal constraints are river water quality and available water resources under the three hydrological scenarios (low, medium, and high). The results show that industrial, domestic, and agricultural water use in the middle and lower reaches were significantly reduced by requiring improved water quality; agriculture suffered the greatest water shortage and risk. As the level of risk control improved, the comprehensive watershed benefits and agricultural risks were gradually reduced. Improving water reuse significantly reduces the risk and increases the benefits. The model can effectively manage rational water allocations under the dual constraints of water quality and quantity, meanwhile alleviating water competition caused by different water benefits to provide support for coordinating the improvement of water quality and socio-economic development in the basin.

The Effect of Water Rights Trading Policy on Water Resource Utilization Efficiency: Evidence from a Quasi-Natural Experiment in China

Water shortage has become a serious problem in the world, and low water efficiency is the key to industrial and agricultural production and sustainable economic development. Based on the data of 30 provinces (municipalities) in China from 2010 to 2017, this study builds a DEA model based on the hybrid network structure of water systems to measure water resource utilization efficiency and uses a difference-in-differences (DID) model to examine the effects of the water rights trading policy on water resource utilization efficiency. We find that the water rights trading policy can significantly promote the total water efficiency of the water resources system and the initial water use efficiency, and after a series of robustness tests, the result is still valid. Further analysis indicates that the policy effect changes with the adjustment of the industrial and agricultural water use structure. Moreover, the dynamic impact of water rights trading policy on water resource utilization efficiency is still significant. This study provides macroscopic evidence for evaluating the effects of China’s water rights trading policy and offers new ideas and experiences for improving China’s water resource utilization efficiency.

Valuing Water (Celebrate World Water Day, 2021): What it is and Why it’s Important

ABSTRACT A 40% increase in the demand of water is expected in the next two decades. This high demand of water is a result of increasing populations, agricultural needs, industrial use of water and electricity use. These statistics must be our motivation to conserve our water. If we want our future generations to have access to fresh, clean water, then we must work together to save our water supply and not waste it. Valuing water is a cornerstone for good water management, preventing conflicts over water allocation and facilitating more sustainable service delivery by ecosystems and infrastructures. Valuing water means recognizing and considering all the diverse benefits and risks provided by water, and encompassing its economic, social, and ecological dimensions as well as its diverse cultural and religious meanings.

Dynamic analysis of residential and enterprise water supply and leakage efficiencies.

With per capita water resources at only around a quarter of the world average, China's water resources are limited and unevenly distributed. Past research on water resource utilization has mainly focused on industrial water use (agriculture and industry), water plant ownership efficiencies (private or public operation), or water resources and economic production; however, there have been few studies focused on water supply livelihood. Therefore, this paper considered both industrial production water services, non-production water services (public sector and residential water use), and water leakage losses, which is a water supply problem seldom mentioned in other studies. An undesirable directional distance function (DDF) dynamic data envelopment analysis (DEA) model was employed for the dynamic analysis as it was able to deal with both desirable and undesirable outputs at the same time. The model examined collected water supply and water leak efficiency data from 30 Chinese provinces/municipalities from 2007 to 2018, from which it was found that (1) Beijing, Gansu, Guangdong, and Ningxia had efficient water supply and water leak losses from 2007 to 2018 and the most improved province was Jiangxi; (2) the eastern provinces, in general, had better water efficiencies and the central and western provinces needed greater improvements; and (3) the lowest water leakage loss efficiencies were in Inner Mongolia, Jiangxi, and Heilongjiang, all of which required significant improvements.

Waterflooding Management: Challenges and Solutions During the Injection Process to Obtain Effectively and Environmentally Based Oil Recovery in Oil and Gas Industry

Water is an important element for every creature in the earth. Almost 70% of earth surface is covered by water. Since 1974, not only contribute to life, water also can be used in oil and gas industry, to improve the oil recovery through waterflooding. Waterflood now became one of oil enhancement methods that often applied in oil field because it’s proved effective can enhance the oil recovery with minimum impacts to ecology and environment. However, the use of water in oil and gas industry requires comprehensive understanding about the technical problem and environmental impact during waterflooding process. Hence, in this study a review is carried out on several problems that occur in the waterflooding injection process and provides solutions so as to be able to manage projects effectively and efficiently also considering the environmental aspects.