Water Resources In Urban Areas Research Articles

Urban Wastewater as a Source of Reclaimed Water for Irrigation: Barriers and Future Possibilities

Water resources are under pressure worldwide, resulting in scarcity and deterioration of freshwater quality. According to European directives, we could reduce the pressure on water resources in urban areas by increasing the reuse of treated wastewater, reducing the impact on water bodies, and promoting water recycling through multiple uses of urban wastewater. Besides the need to address water supply challenges, wastewater treatment systems show environmental stewardship and innovative practices. Using reclaimed water for agricultural irrigation is gaining interest because of the drought conditions experienced in Europe over the past few years. Furthermore, using treated wastewater for agricultural irrigation may help to restore nutrients (N and P) to natural biogeochemical cycles. This review highlights the importance of water reuse, current legislation, and existing technologies to implement in wastewater treatment systems to meet the minimum requirements to produce reclaimed water to reuse in agricultural irrigation.

Management of Urban Waters with Nature-Based Solutions in Circular Cities—Exemplified through Seven Urban Circularity Challenges

Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) have been proven to effectively mitigate and solve resource depletion and climate-related challenges in urban areas. The COST (Cooperation in Science and Technology) Action CA17133 entitled “Implementing nature-based solutions (NBS) for building a resourceful circular city” has established seven urban circularity challenges (UCC) that can be addressed effectively with NBS. This paper presents the outcomes of five elucidation workshops with more than 20 European experts from different backgrounds. These international workshops were used to examine the effectiveness of NBS to address UCC and foster NBS implementation towards circular urban water management. A major outcome was the identification of the two most relevant challenges for water resources in urban areas: ‘Restoring and maintaining the water cycle’ (UCC1) and ‘Water and waste treatment, recovery, and reuse’ (UCC2). s Moreover, significant synergies with ‘Nutrient recovery and reuse’, ‘Material recovery and reuse’, ‘Food and biomass production’, ‘Energy efficiency and recovery’, and ‘Building system recovery’ were identified. Additionally, the paper presents real-life case studies to demonstrate how different NBS and supporting units can contribute to the UCC. Finally, a case-based semi-quantitative assessment of the presented NBS was performed. Most notably, this paper identifies the most typically employed NBS that enable processes for UCC1 and UCC2. While current consensus is well established by experts in individual NBS, we presently highlight the potential to address UCC by combining different NBS and synergize enabling processes. This study presents a new paradigm and aims to enhance awareness on the ability of NBS to solve multiple urban circularity issues.

How Does Digitization Succeed in the Municipal Water Sector? The WaterExe4.0 Meta-Study Identifies Barriers as well as Success Factors, and Reveals Expectations for the Future

Water is increasingly taking center stage when it comes to coping with climate change. Especially in urban areas, negative consequences from heavy rainfall events and prolonged dry periods are rising worldwide. In the past, the various tasks of urban water management were performed by different departments that often did not cooperate with each other (water supply, wastewater disposal, green space irrigation, etc.), as the required water supply was not a question of available water volumes. This is already changing with climate change, in some cases even dramatically. More and more, it is necessary to consider how to distribute available water resources in urban areas, especially during dry periods, since wastewater treatment is also becoming more complex and costly. In the future, urban water management will examine water use in terms of its various objectives, and will need to provide alternative water resources for these different purposes (groundwater, river water, storm water, treated wastewater, etc.). The necessary technological interconnection requires intelligent digital systems. Furthermore, the water industry must also play its role in global CO2 reduction and make its procedural treatment processes more efficient; this will also only succeed with adequate digital systems. Although digitization has experienced an enormous surge in development over the last five years and numerous solutions are available to address the challenges described previously, there is still a large gap between the scope of offerings and their implementation. Researchers at Hof University of Applied Sciences have investigated the reasons for this imbalance as part of WaterExe4.0, the first meta-study on digitization in the German-speaking water industry, funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. Only 11% of roughly 700 identified products, projects and studies relate to real applications. For example, the surveyed experts of the water sector stated that everyday problems are considered too little or hardly at all in new solutions, which greatly overburdens users. Furthermore, they see no adequate possibility for a systematic analysis of new ideas to identify significant obstacles and to find the best way to start and implement a digitization project. The results from four methodologically different sub-surveys (literature and market research, survey, expert interviews and workshops) provide a reliable overview of the current situation in the German-speaking water industry and its expectations for the future. The results are also transferable to other countries.

Effects of Label Noise on Performance of Remote Sensing and Deep Learning-Based Water Body Segmentation Models

Large-scale management of surface water resources in urban areas can be difficult, especially if the region is subject to monsoonal waterlogging. Deep learning-based methods for computer vision tasks, such as image segmentation, can effectively be applied to remote sensing data for generating water body maps of large cities, aiding managerial entities, urban planners and policymakers. The robustness of these models to erroneous pixel level training class labels has not been studied in water body segmentation context. Label noise is commonly experienced in classification tasks and may hinder the performance. We collected and densely labeled Sentinel-2 images over Dhaka, one of the most densely populated and flood prone megacities in the world. We synthetically injected four types of label noise viz., i) Gaussian noise, ii) translation, ii) rotation, and iv) mirroring. Our primary objective is to observe and quantitatively analyze the effects of label noise on remote sensing data-driven deep learning models for water body segmentation. Our results show that salt and pepper noise (injected artificially using Gaussian noise) of only 50% can cause a massive 48.55% drop in Intersection-over-Union score. The consequences of learning from training data with different magnitudes and settings of label noise have been explored.

Cost–benefit analysis of water conservation systems installed in household buildings in Nairobi County

ABSTRACT Cost–benefit analysis of installed water conservation systems (piped water storage, water recycling, and rainwater harvesting) is important in management of water resources in urban areas. This study analysed water conservation systems installed in households in Nairobi County using 200 households’ questionnaires. Benefit–cost ratio analysis indicated that the piped water storage system and rainwater harvesting system were viable with benefits at 2.80 and 2.03, respectively, while the water recycling system was not viable at 0.80. This study recommends installation of piped water storage and rainwater harvesting systems for quality, quantity, and reliable water to be availed in households within viable economic costs.

Study of Sulfate removal using Nanofiltration compared to biological method to access sustainable water resources in urban areas, A case study of Najaf Abad in Iran

Population growth and the need for sustainable urban development as well as lack of water resources due to the position of Iran in the arid and semi-arid zone and the occurrence of recent drought has seriously raised the importance of water scarcity. Nowadays, unconventional water resources are considered as one of the possible solutions to provide water supplies. Among different resources of unconventional waters, the use of wastewater as a sustainable resource for water scarcity management is considered as a strategic strategy. The aim of this study was to compare biological treatment method and nanofiltration method to remove sulfate from industrial wastewater. Thus, industrial wastewater of Najaf Abad treatment plant was used for this purpose and the experiments were carried out for 11 weeks and 11 replications. The appropriate method was chosen by calculating the removal percentage of various parameters and SPSS software was used to analyze the significance of the difference between the results of the two methods. According to the results, the percentage of sulfate removal in all experiments in the nanofiltration system was higher than the biological system and nanofiltration method is more reliable to remove sulfate. So, nanofilter system would be a good alternative for the biological system to reduce and remove sulfate in industrial wastewater.

Sosialisasi dan Pelatihan Rain Water Harvesting (RWH) di SDN Meruya Utara 12, 13 Pagi dan 15 Petang

Rainwater is one of the potential clean water resources in urban areas, such as DKI Jakarta, which has not been used optimally. Related to this, community service activities had been carried out raising theme Rainwater Harvesting (RWH). This agenda was aimed to give education and understanding of RWH to teachers and students of SDN Meruya Utara 12, 13 Pagi and 15 Petang as one way how to conserve rainwater to provide clean water. These activities consisted of the socialization and installation of RWH in schools with a total capacity of 2000 L, where each 1000 L placed at the front of the school for hand washing and in the mosque for ablution purposes. Then agenda was continued with training how to work, to operate and to maintain the RWH equipment. The mass of collected rainwater was distributed into 2 filter tanks before entering the clean water supply tank and ready for use during the dry season. After the RWH had been tested, school residents could feel the benefits. It could reduce the volume of rainwater falling down from the roof of the school building and run-off that occured in the school area so as to avoid flooding. This instalation was able to provide sufficient clean water so that it could reduce the need for using groundwater for daily use. Through this program, school residents have understood the principles of work, how to operate, maintain and can benefit from this RWH.

Comparison of Biological and Nanofiltration methods to reduce the BOD5 of industrial wastewater for the reuse and access to sustainable water resources in urban areas, A case study of Najaf Abad in Iran

The rapid increase of human population accompanied by industrial growth and rising standards of living has resulted in heavy demand for water across all sectors. So, treated wastewater could be an unlimited and stable alternative for water supply to use in irrigation and industry and plays an important role to achieve sustainable urban development. Nowadays, finding an appropriate wastewater treatment & reuse method is one of the important issues which many research has been conducted in this field. The aim of this study was to compare the treated wastewater (industrial) by biological method compared to the nanofiltration method and determine more suitable method for industrial wastewater treatment. Thus, BOD5 of industrial wastewater was used for this purpose and the appropriate method was chosen by calculating the percentage and percentage of this parameter as well as analyzing the significance of the difference between the results of the two methods used by SPSS software. The nanofilter used in the study was made from carbon-neon and the pressure of its desired performance has been 10 times and the diameter of the stomata is 50-80 nm. Also, all experiments were performed weekly for a period of 11 weeks in Najaf Abad wastewater treatment plant. The results showed that the mean BOD5 = 6.87 mg / L measured by nanofiltration method while the mean BOD5 is 9.91 mg / L by biological method. According to the results, the nanofiltration method is more effective than the biological method. Nanofiltration method is suggested to prove the superiority and other water quality parameters are also tested.

Sustainable Management of Water Resources in Urban Areas

Sustainable Management of Water Resources in Urban Areas

O Ministério Público e a participação democrática no compromisso de ajustamento de conduta em matéria urbano-ambiental

Este artigo discute as possibilidades e os limites da atuação do Ministério Público na tomada do Compromisso de Ajustamento de Conduta em matéria urbanoambiental, especialmente para a proteção de recursos hídricos. Busca-se responder a seguinte pergunta: em que medida o Ministério Público pode decidir sobre a realização de audiências públicas para o debate democrático acerca das providências necessárias à tutela de recursos hídricos em áreas urbanas, por meio do Compromisso de Ajustamento de Conduta? A metodologia é baseada em pesquisa bibliográfica e documental, apresentando abordagem qualitativa e analítica. Conclui-se que a gestão de recursos hídricos deve contar com a participação democrática de múltiplos atores sociais, inclusive antes da celebração de Termo de Ajustamento de Conduta no âmbito do Ministério Público, sob pena de invalidade do termo de compromisso.

Coupling groundwater GIS mapping and geovisualisation techniques in urban hydrogeomorphology: focus on methodology

The role of climate, geology, geomorphology, land use/cover, hydraulics and human activities are vital for the balanced and integrated assessment of water resources in urban areas. This approach addresses the key importance on ground field surveys at several scales, a representative hydrological inventory and an integrated groundwater mapping as useful tools to support urban groundwater systems conceptualisation. Lately, a new emphasis has arisen, addressing issues related to an integrated geovisualisation techniques and Geographical Information System (GIS) mapping studies on urban water supply systems, mainly in historical cities. Some key catchments in Porto urban area (NW Portugal) was selected to demonstrate this approach and to show the importance of groundwater GIS mapping for urban studies. The Porto city bedrock is dominated by an anisotropic and heterogeneous fissured media. An extensive field survey yielded data on hydroclimatology, hydrogeology, hydrogeomorphology, urban hydraulics and potential contamination sources. The Infiltration Potential Index in Urban Areas (IPI-Urban), Urban Recharge and Vulnerability Indexes was determined using GIS mapping techniques and hydrological inventory fieldwork. The integrated approach can be incorporated into an urban hydrological management system to support decision making on sustainable groundwater resources and in urban planning.

Pagamento por serviços ambientais de recursos hídricos em áreas urbanas: perspectivas potenciais a partir de um programa de recuperação da qualidade de água na cidade de São Paulo

Resumo O Pagamento por Serviços Ambientais (PSA) vem consolidando-se como estratégia para valorizar e gerenciar os recursos naturais. Este trabalho parte da premissa de que o PSA pode ser instrumento de fortalecimento da gestão sustentável de recursos hídricos em áreas urbanas, em aderência ao preconizado no Plano Diretor Estratégico de São Paulo. Para tanto, discute-se a perspectiva de aplicação de PSA a partir do Programa Córrego Limpo (PCL), que vem desempenhando papel relevante na manutenção da qualidade das águas urbanas de São Paulo. Esta pesquisa exploratória demonstra que os elementos esperados para um caso de sucesso de PSA são encontrados no PCL, em termos de serviços ambientais relevantes, provedores que garantam sua continuidade, identificação de beneficiários e potenciais pagadores.

Location- and Time-Specific Hydrological Simulations with Multi-Resolution Remote Sensing Data in Urban Areas

A major challenge in hydrologic modeling remains the mapping of vegetation dynamics in an urban landscape. The impact of vegetation on interception storage varies over time and needs to be quantified in order to enable proper management of water resources in urban areas. However, the heterogeneity and complexity of the urban landscape makes it challenging to monitor urban vegetation. A more detailed spatial and temporal scale is needed. To characterize surface cover at a high spatial resolution, a hyperspectral APEX image (2 m) is used, while a time series of Proba-V images (daily, 100 m) allows a detailed characterization of the seasonal variation of urban greenness. For this study, we use and validate the leaf area index (LAI) maps derived from APEX and Proba-V data for a selected pixel in the Watermaelbeek catchment in Brussels (Belgium). The ground-truthing of the Proba-V pixels includes a detailed mapping of land cover characteristics and more specifically vegetation cover throughout the seasons. LAI values calculated based on the APEX image agree with the LAI values measured from the ground (n = 106, R 2 = 0.68). Further, the aggregated APEX pixels correlate with the Proba-V pixels ( R 2 = 0.79), and the Proba-V data can be used to monitor vegetation dynamics. As the seasonal LAI measurements correspond with the Proba-V dynamics, we conclude that Proba-V images allow the characterization of vegetation dynamics at a high spatial resolution in heterogeneous areas. We create a time series of LAI maps at a high resolution (2 m), which allows a location- and time-specific simulation of interception storage and thus contributes to managing water resources in urban areas.

Estimación de la demanda de agua para uso residencial urbano usando un modelo discreto-continuo y datos desagregados a nivel de hogar: el caso de la ciudad de Manizales, Colombia

The water demand for urban residential use is estimated for the city of Manizales, Colombia, using a structural model that includes both the discrete choice associated with the consumption block and the continuous choice related to the monthly amount of water consumed. The water demand is econometrically estimated using a unique database for a developing country, which contains data on monthly consumption of water, household size, housing characteristics, weather variables, the marginal price of the respective consumption block and the virtual income for 490 households during the period 1997-2013. The results suggest that the estimated structural model is consistent with utility maximization and seems to be the most appropriate empirical approach to estimate econometrically the water demand for urban residential use. Water demand is inelastic, information that is relevant for policy making and the regulation of water resources in urban areas of Colombia.

Effects of Urbanization on Storm Water Run-off : A Case Study of Kathmandu Metropolitan City, Nepal

In urban and suburban areas, much of the land surface is covered by buildings and pavements, which do not allow precipitation and snowmelt to soak into the ground. Instead, most developed areas rely on storm drains to carry large amounts of runoff from roofs and paved areas to nearby waterways. Hard surfaces such as streets, parking lots and built-up areas are impervious surfaces through which, water cannot pass through. As more and more landscapes are covered with hard impervious surfaces, the amount of water that infltrates, decreases and the amount that runs off, increases. This research is focused on studying run-off conditions in context of urban areas. The study area is Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC). The City is in the stage of rapid urbanization and with it, a rapid increase in built-up spaces. As a result, the city is losing a balance between impervious and pervious cover. Loss of greeneries and unpaved open spaces are causing rapid drain of rain-water. This is creating a disturbance in the hydrological cycle of the area. For assessing the extent of runoff, total runoff was estimated of KMC, as per the surface characteristics and using rational method for calculation. Parameters for determining run-off coeffcients were mainly land cover and land use data, soil type and slope of surface. Results show that current runoff is alarmingly high, indicated by the difference between the run-off values of pre and post-development scenarios. Urban development pattern has caused a major impact, in the prevailing run-off and it is very crucial that these issues are addressed in urban planning to promote effective solutions for maintaining water cycle and water resources in urban areas. Journal of the Institute of Engineering, 2015, 11(1): 36-49

Use of water quality index as a tool for urban water resources management

The quality of water resources in urban areas has undergone degradation due to the discharge of domestic and industrial wastewaters and urbanization among other factors. Despite the legal instruments that aim to preserve water bodies, other mechanisms should be implemented, such as monitoring networks and reporting results. Another challenge is the interpretation of the results that may support decision making on the actions that must be taken to preserve the water quality. In this study, we examined the results of physicochemical and microbiological analyses in a monitoring network that comprised 12 sampling stations. Results were compared with water quality standards established in legislation and calculation of two water quality indexes, the Canadian Council of Ministers of the Environment water quality index (CCME WQI) and the National Sanitation Foundation–Environmental Sanitation Technology Company of the State of Sao Paulo (Cetesb) WQI. Conclusion is that the comparison with quality threshold limits as defined in the legislation, although complete, prevents the reporting on the overall quality of the water body. Application of the quality index allowed communication and interpretation of the results. Another conclusion is that the Cetesb WQI can indicate the degree of contamination of waters impacted by domestic sewage, while the CCME WQI is an effective tool to assess water resources considering different sources of contamination and current legal aspects.

WATER RESOURCES MANAGEMENT IN URBAN AREAS – A SUSTAINABLE SOLUTION THROUGH IBWT

Rapid urban growth threatens sustainable development when the basic pre-requisites such as sustainable and efficient domestic water supply in urban areas are not ensured. Rapid urbanization demands for a sustainable and efficient Water Resources Management for the urban areas. The availability of water is scarce with steady increase in demand of water owing to increasing population, rapid urbanization, etc. and hence there is an immense necessity to augment water availability for domestic utilization. The National Water Policy of Government of India (GOI) revised in 2012 accords over-riding priority to drinking water over other uses. National Water Policy also emphasizes the need for Inter Basin Water Transfer (IBWT) while assigning highest priority for drinking water supply needs followed by other uses. As per the census of India – 2011, the Greater Mumbai with a population of 184.14 lakhs continues to be India’s biggest city. The initial estimates of Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai (MCGM) indicate a gross shortage of about 1053 Mm 3 of water for the domestic requirements of Mumbai. Preliminary water balance studies carried out by National Water Development Agency (NWDA) revealed that surplus waters are available in the Damanganga basin which can be transferred for supplementing the domestic water requirements of Greater Mumbai. Detailed Project Report of D-P link project prepared by NWDA envisages construction of two dams viz., one across river Damanganga near Bhugad village and another at Khargihill across river Vagh (a tributary of Damanganga) along with two tunnels connecting Bhugad, Khargihill & Pinjal reservoirs. Based on studies it has been ascertained that about 210Mm 3 water from Bhugad reservoir and about 369 Mm 3 of water from Khargihill reservoir (total 579 Mm 3 from Damanganga basin), can be transferred to Pinjal reservoir. Thus the combined surplus waters of Bhugad and Khargihill reservoirs of Damanganga basin to the extent of 579 Mm 3 along with surplus waters available at Pinjal reservoir of Vaitarna basin (316 Mm 3 ) totalling to about 895 Mm 3 can be transferred through D-P link to Mumbai city for augmenting its domestic needs. The combined surplus waters of Damanganga and Pinjal rivers will be taken further to Mumbai city as per the planning of MCGM and Mumbai Metropolitan Regional Development Authority (MMRDA). In view of the acute scarcity & stressed water conditions prevalent owing to rapid increase in population and depletion of natural water resources in urban areas, the augmentation of domestic water needs in urban areas can be tackled effectively through IBWT.

Combining Pixel- and Object-Based Machine Learning for Identification of Water-Body Types From Urban High-Resolution Remote-Sensing Imagery

Water is one of the vital components for the ecological environment, which plays an important role in human survival and socioeconomic development. Water resources in urban areas are gradually decreasing due to the rapid urbanization, especially in developing countries. Therefore, the precise extraction and automatic identification of water bodies are of great significance and urgently required for urban planning. It should be noted that although some studies have been reported regarding the water-area extraction, to our knowledge, few papers concern the identification of urban water types (e.g, rivers, lakes, canals, and ponds). In this paper, a novel two-level machine-learning framework is proposed for identifying the water types from urban high-resolution remote-sensing images. The framework consists of two interpretation levels: 1) water bodies are extracted at the pixel level, where the water/shadow/vegetation indexes are considered and 2) water types are further identified at the object level, where a set of geometrical and textural features are used. Both levels employ machine learning for the image interpretation. The proposed framework is validated using the GeoEye-1 and WorldView-2 images, over two mega cities in China, i.e, Wuhan and Shenzhen, respectively. The experimental results show that the proposed method achieved satisfactory accuracies for both water extraction [95.4% (Shenzhen), 96.2% (Wuhan)], and water type classification [94.1% (Shenzhen), 95.9% (Wuhan)] in complex urban areas.

Social Acceptability of Water Resource Management: A Conceptual Approach and Empirical Findings from Portland, Oregon1

Abstract: Surface water resources in urban areas serve multiple functions ranging from recreation to wildlife habitat. As a result, diverse values influence people’s views about resource protection, potentially leading to conflicting interests. In metropolitan Portland, Oregon, natural resource planning has recently focused on habitat restoration as well as stormwater and pollution mitigation, especially through the protection of riparian areas. Due to opposition over proposed regulations in the study region, this research examines public attitudes about an array of resource management efforts. The primary research question is: what is the extent of positive–negative attitudes about water resource protection, and what theoretical dimensions underlie diverse judgments? After empirical survey results are presented, I outline a conceptual approach for future assessments of environmental attitudes while highlighting important value‐based dimensions of judgments. Although flexible, the framework allows broad comparisons to advance knowledge about the social acceptability of varied water resource management approaches across diverse places and contexts.

Water demand management – shifting urban water management towards sustainability

Whereas the world population is increasing at a high rate, especially in urban areas, water resources have not only remained constant, but are being polluted at a high rate, which inevitably results in fresh water scarcity. Current urban water management concepts and practices cannot adequately respond to these changes. There is need for water professionals to change the way they manage water resources in urban areas if we are to ensure economic and environmental sustainability. In addition to consideration of supply-side options, we need to apply water demand management (WDM) tools both on the utility and end-user sides. This paper describes the basic concepts of WDM, provides a case study of their application in Bahrain, and briefly introduces the five-year EU-funded SWTCH Project that aims at creating a paradigm shift in urban water management practices.