Water Quality Policy Research Articles

Concentrations and loads of suspended sediment and trace element pollutants in a small semi-arid urban tributary, San Francisco Bay, California.

Water-quality policy documents throughout the world often identify urban stormwater as a large and controllable impact to sensitive ecosystems, yet there is often limited data to characterize concentrations and loads especially for rare and more difficult to quantify pollutants. In response, concentrations of suspended sediments and silver, mercury and selenium including speciation, and other trace elements were measured in dry and wet weather stormwater flow from a 100% urban watershed near San Francisco. Suspended sediment concentrations ranged between 1.4 and 2700 mg/L and varied with storm intensity. Turbidity was shown to correlate strongly with suspended sediments and most trace elements and was used as a surrogate with regression to estimate concentrations during unsampled periods and to compute loads. Mean suspended sediment yield was 31.5 t/km(2)/year. Total mercury ranged between 1.4 and 150 ng/L and was, on average, 92% particulate, 0.9% methylated, and 1.2% acid labile. Total mercury yield averaged 5.7 μg/m(2)/year. Total selenium ranged between non-detect and 2.9 μg/L and, on average, the total load (0.027 μg/m(2)/year) was 61% transported in dissolved phase. Selenate (Se(VI)) was the dominant species. Silver concentrations ranged between non-detect and 0.11 μg/L. Concentrations and loads of other trace elements were also highly variable and were generally similar to other urban systems with the exceptions of Ag and As (seldom reported) and Cr and Zn which exhibited concentrations and loads in the upper range of those reported elsewhere. Consistent with the semi-arid climatic setting, >95% of suspended sediment, 94% of total Hg, and 85-95 % of all other trace element loads were transported during storm flows with the exception of selenium which showed an inverse relationship between concentration and flow. Treatment of loads is made more challenging in arid climate settings due to low proportions of annual loads and greater dissolved phase during low flow conditions. This dataset fills an important local data gap for highly urban watersheds of San Francisco Bay. The field and interpretative methods, the uniqueness of the analyte list, and resulting information have general applicability for managing pollutant concentrations and loads in urban watersheds in other parts of the world and may have particularly useful application in more arid climates.

Subnational diplomacy in the Great Lakes region: toward explaining variation between water quality and quantity regimes

/RésumésSubnational diplomacy is increasingly important in foreign policy and Canada-United States relations. The Great Lakes region represents an excellent laboratory for studying the role of subnational governments in foreign policy. This article focuses on water policy in the Great Lakes region, and the central research question of why subnational diplomacy varies across water quality and water quantity policy regimes. Using a comparative case approach, the paper investigates the degree to which the character of the policy challenge itself, constitutional and institutional arrangements, and the nature of federalism and intergovernmental relations in the two countries explain differing levels of subnational diplomacy. One case illustrates how institutionalized relationships between subnational units that share interests in a transboundary resource cooperate to engage in subnational diplomacy; the other illustrates more traditional involvement of subnational governments in foreign policy, highlighting that these factors hold significant promise in explaining variation in subnational diplomacy and support existing theory in the paradiplomacy literature.

Concentrations and loads of PCBs, dioxins, PAHs, PBDEs, OC pesticides and pyrethroids during storm and low flow conditions in a small urban semi-arid watershed

Urban runoff has been identified in water quality policy documents for San Francisco Bay as a large and potentially controllable source of pollutants. In response, concentrations of suspended sediments and a range of trace organic pollutants were intensively measured in dry weather and storm flow runoff from a 100% urban watershed. Flow in this highly urban watershed responded very quickly to rainfall and varied widely resulting in rapid changes of turbidity, suspended sediments and pollutant concentrations. Concentrations of each organic pollutant class were within similar ranges reported in other studies of urban runoff, however comparison was limited for several of the pollutants given information scarcity. Consistently among PCBs, PBDEs, and PAHs, the more hydrophobic congeners were transported in larger proportions during storm flows relative to low flows. Loads for Water Years 2007–2010 were estimated using regression with turbidity during the monitored months and a flow weighted mean concentration for unmonitored dry season months. More than 91% of the loads for every pollutant measured were transported during storm events, along with 87% of the total discharge. While this dataset fills an important local data gap for highly urban watersheds of San Francisco Bay, the methods, the uniqueness of the analyte list, and the resulting interpretations have applicability for managing pollutant loads in urban watersheds in other parts of the world.

Fragmented water quality governance: Constraints to spatial targeting for nutrient reduction in a Midwestern USA watershed

Spatially targeted interventions improve the effectiveness of environmental policy, but are challenged by implementation constraints and coordination among governments. Spatial targeting research rarely acknowledges the diversity of actors navigating complicated institutional dynamics to deploy environmental policy instruments. We mapped 35 nutrient reduction interventions by federal, state, county, and municipal governments and interviewed 15 policymakers and agency staff in Wisconsin's Yahara Watershed, USA to understand how multilevel governance impacts spatial targeting and implementation of water quality policy. Our Geographic Information System database showed that county governments implemented the most policies, while the state promulgated the most rules, with uneven application of policy interventions across the landscape. Spatial targeting differed between agricultural and non-agricultural policies and by type of tool (land acquisition, direct management, incentive, and regulation). We found a negative correlation between areas of policy intervention and phosphorus yield across government levels (p<0.001), with the strongest negative correlations by implementing agency. Interviews revealed that for government agencies, spatial targeting is constrained by program and funding requirements and data limitations for soil and land use practices. In order to target the highest phosphorus yielding subwatersheds, governments will need to alter the spatial location of their efforts.

Reference-Dependence Effects in Benefit Assessment: Beyond the WTA–WTP Dichotomy and WTA–WTP Ratios

Willingness-to-pay (WTP) values and willingness-to-accept (WTA) values have received considerable attention, but the role of reference-dependence effects is more diverse. Policies involving cost and risk may have reference point effects with respect to both cost and risk, leading to four potential valuation measures. Experimental evidence for water quality policies suggests that the cost reference effects are particularly influential in that context. There is, however, no evidence of significant reference effects for labor market estimates of the value of a statistical life. Sound application of benefit values other than WTP measures requires pertinent empirical evidence and an assessment of the underlying rationality of the determinants of the reference-dependence effects.

농촌의 비닐하우스 재배지역에서 배출되는 강우유출수의 특성

In national water quality policy, it changed previous regulation method that focuses on concentration of pollutants in effluent water to the way that regulates total amount of pollutants. The target of water quality in watershed of each river was set up, as the government instituted Total Maximum Daily Loads(TMDL). In order to accomplish successfully TMDL, it requires that the amount of pollutant loads discharged from point and nonpoint pollutant source should be investigated. This study, therefore, conducted the monitoring of the stormwater runoff at field region in farming area. And pollutants loads and unit loads discharged from field region results is calculated. As a result, the concentration of pollutants were calculated as follows: 10.5 BOD mg/L, 19.6 CODMn mg/L , 4.5 TN mg/L and 2.4 TP mg/L. The unit load of BOD, CODMn, TOC, TSS, TN and TP discharged from field region, also, were determined to 31.8kg/km/yr, 56.7kg/km/yr, 8.5kg/km/yr, 560.9kg/km/yr, 8.3kg/km/yr and 5.1kg/km/yr, respectively. It was identified that there were some differences of unit loads between the results obtained from this study and previous one. To calculate exact unit loads, therefore, long term monitoring should be conducted.

Context and capacity: The potential for performance-based agricultural water quality policy

Current Canadian policy approaches to agricultural water quality encourage the adoption of best management practices through voluntary, incentive-based measures. Despite these measures, concerns about agricultural impacts on water quality persist. Performance-based policy approaches with incentives that are tied to defined outcomes, and not to particular practices, may have an important role in managing water quality. Five performance-based approaches to address water quality in agricultural landscapes were identified: water quality trading/permitting, differentiated payments for ecosystem services, reverse auctions; emissions charges, and cross-compliance (a hybrid measure). The purpose of this paper is to critically assess the institutional and socio-cultural context that facilitated existing performance-based policy instrument adoption. Through this analysis, three key contextual factors were identified as enablers of performance based approaches: (1) social context, (2) institutional capacity and (3) standardized, consistent and robust estimation methodologies. A framework was developed to classify performance based programs and approaches. The application of the findings from this research and the classification framework provide an organized approach to assess the feasibility of implementing performance-based approaches for agri-environmental water quality policy.

Mineralogical and anthropogenic controls of stream water chemistry in salted watersheds

The relatively stable concentrations of calcium (42.2–122.3mg/l) and magnesium (48.9–88.1mg/l) between 2012 and 2013 and their possible weathering paths identified by mass balance models for both soil solutions and stream water from a small salted (regular applications of winter road deicing salt) watershed in New Jersey, USA indicate that the weathering of feldspars and dissolution of carbonates are the primary sources for these cations. However, the relatively stable and lower concentrations of sodium and chloride in soil solutions (19.6–46.1mg/l for Na and 12.7–88.3mg/l for Cl) and their fluctuating and higher concentrations in stream water (14.6–103.1mg/l for Na and 15.2–260.4mg/l)) from the same watershed during the same period also indicate that road deicing salt is the primary source for sodium and chloride in stream water. Furthermore, positive correlations between calcium and sulfur concentrations (correlation coefficient r=0.77) and magnesium and sulfur concentrations (r=0.73) in stream water between 2009 and 2013, as well as positive correlations between sulfur and iron concentrations in soil compositions (r=0.27), indicate that both the dissolution of gypsum and the oxidation of pyrite into hematite might be the primary sources of sulfate in the watershed. Analyses of water chemistry from the related and much larger Delaware River Watershed (DRW) show that sodium and chloride concentrations have increased steadily (2.7 times for Na and 4.56 times for Cl for 10-year average) due to the regular application of winter deicing salt from 1944 to 2011 for which data are available. The greater increase of stream water chloride concentrations compared with sodium concentrations also results in the steady decline of Na+/Cl− molar ratios from 1.51 to 0.92 for the 10-year average during that time in the DRW and approximately 78% of the chloride in the DRW now being anthropogenic. In addition, the decline of sulfate concentration from 22.08 to 14.59mg/l (∼34%) for the 10-year average from 1980 to 2011 in the DRW stream water may be attributed to the decline of sulfate levels in atmospheric deposition resulting from enhanced national and state environmental regulations and a shift in local economic activities. There also are more periods of low silica stream water concentrations in the DRW than in the past, perhaps as a result of recent increases in summer stream temperatures combined with an increase of impervious surface area in the region. Warmer stream water might cause the temporary bloom of biota requiring silica, particularly plankton, increasing its uptake from stream water, while an expanded impervious surface area increases the contribution of low-silica runoff water to total stream discharge, thereby lowering the silica concentration in stream water. The combined results of this study illustrate the possible changing anthropogenic factors that can control stream water chemistry in salted watersheds and that these factors need to be taken into account when future water quality regulations and policy are considered.

Temporal variability in groundwater and surface water quality in humid agricultural catchments; driving processes and consequences for regional water quality monitoring

Considering the large temporal variability in surface water quality is essential for adequate water quality policy and management. Neglecting these dynamics may easily lead to decreased effectiveness of measures to improve water quality and to inefficient water quality monitoring. The objective of this paper is to summarise our understanding of temporal variability in surface water and upper groundwater quality and to discuss the consequences and opportunities for regional water quality monitoring. In regional monitoring networks, measurement frequencies are typically too low to capture the short-term temporal variations in solute concentrations. This causes large uncertainty in the assessment of (trends in) average concentrations and contaminant loads. The most important driver for short-term variations in water quality in most catchments is the variability in meteorological conditions, which induces changes in the relative discharge contributions of water from different flow routes and different chemical compositions. Various options exist for dealing with the transient behavior of water quality in regional water quality monitoring. Estimates of average concentrations and loads from low-frequency concentration data can be improved by using the explanatory strength of commonly available measurements of quantitative hydrological data like precipitation, discharge, and groundwater levels. This paper provides examples of the relationship between water quality and explanatory variables in conceptual, statistical, or process-based models. Another strategy for dealing with short-term variability in water quality monitoring is to measure long-term average solute concentrations using passive samplers. Similarly, on-site auto analyzers and ion specific electrodes provide opportunities for continuous water quality measurements.

The Value of Forest Conservation for Water Quality Protection

Forests protect water quality by reducing soil erosion, sedimentation, and pollution; yet there is little information about the economic value of conserving forests for water quality protection in much of the United States. To assess this value, we conducted a meta-analysis of willingness-to-pay (WTP) for protecting unimpaired waters, and econometrically determined several significant drivers of WTP: type of conservation instrument (tool), aquatic resource type, geographic context, spatial scale, time, and household income. Using a benefit transfer to two highly forested sites, we illustrate the importance of these factors on WTP for water quality protection programs, forest conservation and policy design.

Regulatory protection and definition for recreational uses of Florida lakes

National- and state-level water quality policies clearly set forth the intention to protect recreational uses of lakes. Nevertheless, the Clean Water Act, the Florida Water Resources Act, and Florida's Surface Water Quality Standards fail to define recreational uses of lakes. This research presents a generalized definition for recreational uses of Florida lakes and a quantification of the proportion of Floridians that recreate in lakes. Data collected from a survey of 503 Floridians indicate that approximately 23% of Floridians participate in lake-based recreation. A derived definition for the recreational use of Florida lakes, in order of reported use frequency, is “recreation activities of Florida lakes include, but are not limited to, relaxing, boating, fishing, viewing nature, picnicking, swimming, camping, tubing, hunting, wakeboarding, diving, and water skiing.” This generalized definition highlights the diversity of activities occurring in Florida lakes and can inform the regulatory process related to the management of lake water nutrient concentrations. As Florida moves forward in establishing management strategies for its surface waters, defining recreational uses for its diverse set of lakes is imperative to their protection.

UK peatland restoration: Some economic arithmetic

Over 80% of UK peatlands are degraded to some extent and their widespread restoration could contribute to meeting various climate change, water quality and biodiversity policy challenges. Economic analysis of costs and benefits is, however, hampered by scientific uncertainty and a lack of data on biophysical conditions as well as the impacts and costs of restoration. This paper presents a simple ‘ready-reckoner’ of possible net economic benefits under different combinations of simplifying ‘what if?’ assumptions for key restoration parameters. The results strongly suggest that even a narrow focus on carbon benefits alone is sufficient to justify restoration in many cases, and the inclusion of possible additional non-carbon benefits reinforces this. However, results are sensitive to assumptions and better data for, in particular, restoration costs associated with modest emission savings from lightly degraded sites would be helpful. Some other areas for further research are also identified.

A combined statistical approach for evaluation of the effects of land use, agricultural and urban activities on stream water chemistry in small tile-drained catchments of south Bohemia, Czech Republic

This work evaluates the changes of nitrate-nitrogen (NO3-N), ammonium-nitrogen (NH4-N), total phosphorus (P) and chemical oxygen demand (COD) concentrations in stream waters as related to the land use/land cover (LULC) alterations within eight small (5–39 km2) tile-drained catchments in the southern part of The Czech Republic in the period 1993–2010, when massive grassing of arable land took place. The robust tools of seasonal Mann–Kendall trend test and LOcally WEighted Scatterplot Smoothing methods were employed to reveal trends of the monitored parameters with adjustment to hydrology. Using principal component analysis and multiple regressions, statistically significant factors with highest impacts on the assessed water quality parameters were identified. Besides indicators of LULC changes in the catchments and their various zones, information of built tile drainage systems were used along with factors reflecting point pollution sources such as the population number, sewerage type and proximity to a watercourse, effectiveness of wastewater treatment, and number of livestock units. The change in LULC was essential only for NO3-N concentrations, when grassing of arable land, presence of water ponds, areas of permanent cultures and also areas of drained land explained up to 90.6 % NO3-N variability and nitrate-nitrogen concentrations showed a significantly decreasing trend in all monitored catchments during the evaluated period. LULC changes within infiltration vulnerable zones were discovered as less important for the assessed water quality parameters compared to LULC changes in the whole catchment area. However, for NH4-N, P and COD, the results did not enable a definite quantification of the effects of LULC changes. The influence of non-point pollution sources on these parameters was revealed as uncertain and was heavily overshadowed by point sources, in particular by wastewater management, and livestock numbers, although the proportion of arable land in tile drainage subcatchments was discovered fundamental in case of the COD. The increasing numbers of livestock, population, and changes in sewage treatment led in some catchments to significant worsening of water quality. Achieved findings may be critical for supporting water quality policy and management decisions.

Does complex hydrology require complex water quality policy?

Nonpoint‐source water pollution is frequently considered intractable because it is hard to regulate large numbers of small sources and because the science associated with assessing the impact of each source is complex. New Zealand has demonstrated that it is possible to implement a simple cap‐and‐trade system to help reduce nitrogen leaching from many small farms and thereby protect water quality. This paper relates to the second challenge: are complex regulatory systems worthwhile when nitrogen delivery is complex? When nitrogen moves through groundwater to a lake, leaching from different farms reaches the lake at different times and the damage caused is temporally differentiated. Policy that regulates farmers according to the timing of their nitrogen delivery will be more complex than policy that does not. Whether the gain in efficiency justifies this additional complexity can be assessed through modelling. We use an integrated model to estimate the gains from complex nitrogen regulation that incorporates groundwater delivery times relative to simple nitrogen regulation that does not. We find that the gains from more complex regulation are small in the catchment we study and cannot justify the additional complexity required. A sensitivity analysis enables us to identify the types of catchments where complex regulation may be worthwhile.

Water pollution during China's industrial transition

The ever increasing water demands arising from population and economic growth during China's industrial transition exerts significant stress on the country's limited freshwater resources. Meanwhile, widespread water pollution that occurred during the course of industrialization exacerbates the water shortages. This work presents an overview on the water shortages and water pollution in China, and analyzes the root causes of water pollution—increased pollutant discharges from industrial, municipal and agricultural sources, excessive water abstraction from the environment, and poor water resources management and enforcement of pollution control regulations. The three key drivers of long-term water quality improvement, namely, economic transformation, technological innovation, and institutional and policy reforms, are then discussed in details. The trend of China's surface water quality over the last two decades supports that China is approaching the critical point in its industrial transition where reduction of pollution and improvement of environmental quality are going to occur. Policy measures and institutional reforms are also recommended to accelerate the reversal of surface water quality in China.

Catchment science and policy for agriculture and water quality

► This paper prefaces 12 state-of-the-science contributions relating to water quality policy and management in agricultural catchments. ► The contributions relate to examples in the European Union on uncertainty, scale and economic perspectives. ► Policy uptake, biophysical and confounding influences on mitigation measures, policy participation and ecosystems services provision are reviewed.

Agri-political Organizations in Environmental Governance: Representing Farmer Interests in Regional Partnerships

Investigations of agri-environmental programmes and their implementation often overlook the contribution of agri-political organizations (APOs). They focus instead upon the experiences of individual farmers, or the potential of farmers to be environmental stewards, the strategies or particular policy instruments employed by governments, or the workings of cooperative planning committees at river basin scales. Over the last decade in Australia, the influence and involvement of APOs in initiatives such as regional natural resource planning and the implementation of water quality policies has increased markedly but has remained largely under-researched. This paper indicates the ways these groups are becoming more embedded in the politics and operation of environmental governance and outlines the new and contested roles these groups are now playing in Australian rural landscapes. Using the case of the ongoing implementation of the Reef Water Quality Protection Plan, the paper explores tensions in the current arrangements and considers implications for ongoing participation of the farming sector in environmental governance. These tensions revolve around challenges to APOs’ traditional dialogic practices; interest-based models of representation; and their capacity to align with and operate within new territorial spaces of policy implementation, such as regions.

Implementing In-Stream Nutrient Processes in Large-Scale Landscape Modeling for the Impact Assessment on Water Quality

For a long time, watershed models focused on the transport of chemicals from the terrestrial part of the watershed to the surface water bodies by leaching and erosion. After the substances had reached the surface water, they were routed through the channel network often without any further transformation. Today, there is a need to extend watershed models with in-stream processes to bring them closer to natural conditions and to enhance their usability as support tools for water management and water quality policies. This paper presents experience with implementing in-stream processes in a ecohydrological dynamic watershed model and its application on the large scale in the Saale River basin in Germany. Results demonstrate that new implemented water quality parameters like chlorophyll a concentrations or oxygen amount in the reach can be reproduced quite well, although the model results, compared with results achieved without taking into account algal and transformation processes in the river, show obvious improvement only for some of the examined nutrients. Finally, some climate and water management scenarios expected to impact in-stream processes in the Saale basin were run. Their results illustrate the relative importance of physical boundary conditions on the amount and concentration of the phytoplankton, which leads to the conclusion that measures to improve water quality should not only take nutrient inputs into account but also climate influences and river morphology.

Reforming Agricultural Nonpoint Pollution Policy in an Increasingly Budget-Constrained Environment

Agricultural nonpoint source water pollution has long been recognized as an important contributor to U.S. water quality problems and the subject of an array of local, state, and federal initiatives to reduce the problem. A "pay-the-polluter" approach to getting farmers to adopt best management practices has not succeeded in improving water quality in many impaired watersheds. With the prospects of reduced funding for the types of financial and technical assistance programs that have been the mainstay of agricultural water quality policy, alternative approaches need to be considered. Some changes to the way current conservation programs are implemented could increase their efficiency, but there are limits to how effective a purely voluntary approach can be. An alternative paradigm is the "polluter pays" approach, which has been successfully employed to reduce point source pollution. A wholesale implementation of the polluter-pays approach to agriculture is likely infeasible, but elements of the polluter-pays approach could be incorporated into agricultural water quality policy.

Preparing for a Rainy Day – Overview of Treatment Technology Options for Wet-Weather Flow Management

Successful wet-weather flow management requires a multi-pronged approach. Planners and designers should consider a wide variety of source control, conveyance, and treatment alternatives to provide the optimum long-term solution for each watershed. Municipal utilities now have a larger variety of feasible treatment alternatives than ever, and many of today’s stateof-the-art technologies were not available a generation ago when most of North America’s water quality regulations and policies were crafted. Significant advances have been made since then, both in treatment technologies and in the profession’s understanding of wet-weather problems. Many of these “new” treatment technologies have been in operation for over a decade, proving their capabilities. This paper discusses many of these technologies, their potential advantages and disadvantages, and how each might fit into an existing treatment strategy and contribute to a utility’s water quality goals.