Abstract: On-site stormwater detention (OSD) is a conventional component of urban drainage systems, designed with the intention of mitigating the increase to peak discharge of stormwater runoff that inevitably results from urbanization. In Australia, singular temporal patterns for design storms have governed the inputs of hydrograph generation and in turn the design process of OSD for the last three decades. This paper raises the concern that many existing OSD systems designed using the singular temporal pattern for design storms may not be achieving their stated objectives when they are assessed against a variety of alternative temporal patterns. The performance of twenty real OSD systems was investigated using two methods: (1) ensembles of design temporal patterns prescribed in the latest version of Australian Rainfall and Runoff, and (2) real recorded rainfall data taken from pluviograph stations modeled with continuous simulation. It is shown conclusively that the use of singular temporal patterns is ineffective in providing assurance that an OSD will mitigate the increase to peak discharge for all possible storm events. Ensemble analysis is shown to provide improved results. However, it also falls short of providing any guarantee in the face of naturally occurring rainfall.
Abstract: Hydraulic models for the generation of ?ood inundation maps are not commonly applied in mountain river basins because of the dif?culty in modeling the hydraulic behavior and the complex topography. This paper presents a comparative analysis of the performance of four twodimensional hydraulic models (HEC-RAS 2D, Iber 2D, Flood Modeller 2D, and PCSWMM 2D) with respect to the generation of ?ood inundation maps. The study area covers a 5-km reach of the Santa Barbara River located in the Ecuadorian Andes, at 2330 masl, in Gualaceo. The model's performance was evaluated based on the water surface elevation and ?ood extent, in terms of the mean absolute difference and measure of ?t. The analysis revealed that, for a given case, Iber 2D has the best performance in simulating the water level and inundation for ?ood events with 20- and 50-year return periods, respectively, followed by Flood Modeller 2D, HEC-RAS 2D, and PCSWMM 2D in terms of their performance. Grid resolution, the way in which hydraulic structures are mimicked, the model code, and the default value of the parameters are considered the main sources of prediction uncertainty.
Abstract: The challenges posed by climate change require that the quantity and quality of water resources in Nepal be managed with sustainable development practices. The communities around the Kaligandaki Gorge Hydropower Project in the Myagdi District of Nepal depend on river flow for most of their rural and agricultural needs. Without a sustainable development plan, the growing population of the region, confined in an area with declining water resources, will face serious challenges to economic growth. Meteorological data show increasing annual average rainfall at a slight rate of about 0.284 mm/year, with erratic annual percentage change in rainfall in the area. The mean and minimum temperatures show decreasing trends at the rates of 0.05°C and 0.14°C per year, respectively. An assessment of the impacts on water availability for domestic and irrigation usage in the face of competing demands caused by the hydropower development project in the Kaligandaki Gorge was undertaken. The water demand and supply modeling were conducted using the water evaluation and planning (WEAP) model, based on discharge data from the Kaligandaki River, which were obtained from the Department of Hydrology and Meteorology, Nepal. The available data from 2001 to 2003 were used to estimate the model parameters while the stability of these parameters was tested with a validation period from 2004 to 2007. The performance of the model was assessed through statistical measures of calibration with the root mean square error and coefficient of determination, whose values were 0.046% and 0.79, respectively. Two scenarios were created in addition to the base case scenario: the discharge decrement scenario and new irrigation technology scenario. Analysis showed that a prioritization of demands will be necessary in the area in the near future for the purpose of sustainability of water resources, due to climate change impacts.
Abstract: This study aimed to investigate the biosorption potential of Na2CO3-modified Aloe barbadensis Miller (Aloe vera) leaf (MABL) powder for removal of Ni(II) ions from a synthetic aqueous solution. Effects of various process parameters (pH, equilibrium time, and temperature) were investigated in order to optimize the biosorptive removal. The maximum biosorption capacity of MABL was observed to be 28.986 mg/g at a temperature of 303 K, a biosorbent dose of 0.6 g, a contact time of 90 min, and a pH value of 7. Different kinetic models (the pseudo-first-order, pseudo-second-order, Elovich, and intraparticle diffusion models) were evaluated. The pseudo-second-order kinetic model was found to be the best fitted model in this study, with a coefficient of determination of R2 = 0.974. Five different isotherm models (the Langmuir, Freundlich, Temkin, Dubinin-Radushkevich, and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) models) were investigated to identify the best-suited isotherm model for the present system. Based on the minimum chi-square value (χ2 = 0.027) and the maximum coefficient of determination (R2 = 0.996), the Langmuir isotherm model was found to represent the system well, indicating the possibility of monolayer biosorption. The sticking probability (S*) was found to be 0.41, suggesting a physisorption mechanism for biosorption of Ni(II) on MABL. The biosorbent was characterized using Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), zeta potential, and BET surface area, in order to understand its morphological and functional characteristics.
Abstract: Large quantities of sludge are produced during water treatment processes. Recently, sludge has been treated as waste and disposed of in landfills, which increases the environmental burdens and the operational cost. Therefore, sludge reuse has become a significant environmental issue. In this study, adsorption of copper ions (Cu2+) onto calcined sludge was investigated under various operational conditions (with varying temperature, Cu2+ initial concentration, pH, and sludge dosage). The prepared sludge material was characterized with transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), dynamic light scattering (DLS), and Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area. The sorption capacity of sludge was directly proportional to the initial Cu2+ concentration and inversely proportional to the sludge dosage. The optimum operational pH and solution temperature were 6.6 and 80℃, respectively. The experimental results followed a Langmuir isotherm and pseudo-first-order adsorption kinetics. Thermodynamic parameters such as activation energy, change in free energy, enthalpy, and entropy were calculated. Thermodynamic analyses indicated that the sorption of copper ions onto the calcined sludge was driven by a physical adsorption process. The prepared sludge was proven to be an excellent adsorbent material for the removal of Cu2+ from an aqueous solution under optimum conditions.
Abstract: Water quality is always one of the most important factors in human health. Artificial intelligence models are respected methods for modeling water quality. The evolutionary algorithm (EA) is a new technique for improving the performance of artificial intelligence models such as the adaptive neuro fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) and artificial neural networks (ANN). Attempts have been made to make the models more suitable and accurate with the replacement of other training methods that do not suffer from some shortcomings, including a tendency to being trapped in local optima or voluminous computations. This study investigated the applicability of ANFIS with particle swarm optimization (PSO) and ant colony optimization for continuous domains (ACOR) in estimating water quality parameters at three stations along the Zayandehrood River, in Iran. The ANFIS-PSO and ANFIS-ACOR methods were also compared with the classic ANFIS method, which uses least squares and gradient descent as training algorithms. The estimated water quality parameters in this study were electrical conductivity (EC), total dissolved solids (TDS), the sodium adsorption ratio (SAR), carbonate hardness (CH), and total hardness (TH). Correlation analysis was performed using SPSS software to determine the optimal inputs to the models. The analysis showed that ANFIS-PSO was the better model compared with ANFIS-ACOR. It is noteworthy that EA models can improve ANFIS' performance at all three stations for different water quality parameters.
Abstract: Hydroxyquinone compounds, such as 1,4-dihydroxyanthraquinone and alizarin sulfonate, are widely used in dye manufacturing, pharmaceutical manufacturing, and other industries. However, the treatment of hydroxyquinone-containing wastewater has seldom been examined. This study used a precipitation method with barium salt to treat nano-silver industrial wastewater. The results show that barium chloride was a suitable reagent for significantly degrading COD and color from nano-silver wastewater. When the initial pH value was 10.5, 8 g of BaCl2•2H2O was added to 100 mL of wastewater. After reaction at 15oC for 1 h, the removal efficiencies of COD and color in the nano-silver wastewater were 85.6% and 97.1%, respectively. Simulated wastewater containing sodium alizarin-3-sulfonate (ARS) or purpurin was used to further investigate the removal mechanism of hydroxyquinone compounds. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, and some related experiments showed that hydroxyquinone compounds can directly react with barium ions in the solution so as to transfer from wastewater to precipitate. In addition, the newly produced barium sulfate particles have positive surface charges, which can improve the removal efficiency of hydroxyquinone compounds due to electrostatic attraction.
Abstract: Over recent years, there has been a clear increase in the frequency of reported flooding events around the world. Gabion structures offer one means of flood mitigation in dam spillways. These types of structures provide an additional challenge to the computational modeller in that flow through the porous gabions must be simulated. We have used a computational model to investigate the flow over gabion stepped spillways. The model was first validated against published experimental results. Then, gabion stepped spillways with four different step geometries were tested under the same conditions in order to facilitate inter-comparisons and to choose the best option in terms of energy dissipation. The results show that normal gabion steps can dissipate more energy than overlap, inclined, and pooled steps. An intensive set of tests with varying slope, stone size, and porosity were undertaken. The location of the inception point and the water depth at this point obtained from this study were compared with those from existing formulae. Two new empirical equations have been derived, on the basis of regression, to provide improved results for gabion stepped spillways.
Abstract: The vertical profiles of longshore currents have been examined experimentally over plane and barred beaches. In most cases, the vertical profiles of longshore currents are expressed by the logarithmic law. The power law is not commonly used to describe the profile of longshore currents. In this paper, however, a power-type formula is proposed to describe the vertical profiles of longshore currents. The formula has two parameters: the power law index (a) and the depth-averaged velocity. Based on previous studies, power law indices were set as a = 1/10 and a = 1/7. Depth-averaged velocity can be obtained through measurement. The fitting of the measured velocity profiles to a = 1/10 and a = 1/7 was assessed for the vertical longshore profiles. The vertical profile of longshore currents is well described by the power-type formula with a = 1/10 for a plane beach. However, for a barred beach, different values of a needed to be used for different regions. For the region from the bar trough to the offshore side of the bar crest, the vertical profiles of longshore currents given by the power-type formula with a = 1/10 and a = 1/7 fit the data well. However, the fit was slightly better with a = 1/10 than that with a = 1/7. For the data over the trough region of cross-shore distribution of the depth-averaged longshore currents, the power formula with a = 1/3 provided a good fit. The formulas with a = 1/10 and a = 1/7 were further examined using published data from four sources covering laboratory and field experiments. The results indicate that the power-type formula fits the data well for the laboratory and field data with a = 1/10.
