Urban stormwater harvesting: a valuable water resource of Singapore

2011 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
M. H. Lim ◽  
Y. H. Leong ◽  
K. N. Tiew ◽  
Harry Seah
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Water Supply ◽  
Water Resource ◽  
Quality Data ◽  
Catchment Management ◽  
Urban Stormwater ◽  
Water Quality Data ◽  
The World ◽  
Stormwater Harvesting ◽  
Urban Catchments

Increasing water demand due to socioeconomic developments and reducing fresh water sources caused by pollution and global climate change which alters the hydrologic cycle, have imposed severe water stress to many countries in the world. Singapore was among the first cities in the world to harvest stormwater from urban catchments to supplement its water supply. Strategic water resource policies with holistic, well coordinated land use and integrated catchment management were the prerequisites for stormwater harvesting. Water sampling campaigns and evaluation of past 20 years’ water quality data of the stormwater reservoirs showed that the pollutant loads to the receiving reservoirs are very low compared to the stormwater pollutant data reported by Makepeace et al. (1995) who reviewed the past 25 years’ international literature; and that the water quality of the stormwater reservoirs is good and comparable with a protected upland reservoir, and do not pose any significant health risks. The paper concluded that with effective pollutant source management, urban stormwater harvesting is a feasible means to supplement the water supply in cities with high rainfall.

A national approach to risk assessment for drinking water catchments in Australia

2005 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 123-134 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. Miller ◽  
B. Whitehill ◽  
D. Deere
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Risk Assessment ◽  
Land Use ◽  
Drinking Water ◽  
Water Supply ◽  
Supply System ◽  
Drinking Water Quality ◽  
Water Utilities ◽  
Quality Data ◽  
Water Quality Data

This paper comments on the strengths and weaknesses of different methodologies for risk assessment, appropriate for utilisation by Australian Water Utilities in risk assessment for drinking water source protection areas. It is intended that a suggested methodology be recommended as a national approach to catchment risk assessment. Catchment risk management is a process for setting priorities for protecting drinking water quality in source water areas. It is structured through a series of steps for identifying water quality hazards, assessing the threat posed, and prioritizing actions to address the threat. Water management organisations around Australia are at various stages of developing programs for catchment risk management. While much conceptual work has been done on the individual components of catchment risk management, work on these components has not previously been combined to form a management tool for source water protection. A key driver for this project has been the requirements of the National Health and Medical Research Council Framework for the Management of Drinking Water Quality (DWQMF) included in the draft 2002 Australian Drinking Water Guidelines (ADWG). The Framework outlines a quality management system of steps for the Australian water industry to follow with checks and balances to ensure water quality is protected from catchment to tap. Key steps in the Framework that relate to this project are as follows: Element 2 Assessment of the Drinking Water Supply System• Water Supply System analysis• Review of Water Quality Data• Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment Element 3 Preventive Measures for Drinking Water Quality Management• Preventive Measures and Multiple Barriers• Critical Control Points This paper provides an evaluation of the following risk assessment techniques: Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP); World Health Organisation Water Safety Plans; Australian Standard AS 4360; and The Australian Drinking Water Guidelines – Drinking Water Quality Management Framework. These methods were selected for assessment in this report as they provided coverage of the different approaches being used across Australia by water utilities of varying: scale of water management organisation; types of water supply system management; and land use and activity-based risks in the catchment area of the source. Initially, different risk assessment methodologies were identified and reviewed. Then examples of applications of those methods were assessed, based on several key water utilities across Australia and overseas. Strengths and weaknesses of each approach were identified. In general there seems some general grouping of types of approaches into those that: cover the full catchment-to-tap drinking water system; cover just the catchment area of the source and do not recognise downstream barriers or processes; use water quality data or land use risks as a key driving component; and are based primarily on the hazard whilst others are based on a hazardous event. It is considered that an initial process of screening water quality data is very valuable in determining key water quality issues and guiding the risk assessment, and to the overall understanding of the catchment and water source area, allowing consistency with the intentions behind the ADWG DWQM Framework. As such, it is suggested that the recommended national risk assessment approach has two key introductory steps: initial screening of key issues via water quality data, and land use or activity scenario and event-based HACCP-style risk assessment. In addition, the importance of recognising the roles that uncertainty and bias plays in risk assessments was highlighted. As such it was deemed necessary to develop and integrate uncertainty guidelines for information used in the risk assessment process. A hybrid risk assessment methodology was developed, based on the HACCP approach, but with some key additions and modifications to make it applicable to varying catchment risks, water supply operation needs and environmental management processes.

Urban water quality modelling: a parsimonious holistic approach for a complex real case study

2010 ◽  
Vol 61 (2) ◽  
pp. 521-536 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabriele Freni ◽  
Giorgio Mannina ◽  
Gaspare Viviani
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Wastewater Treatment Plants ◽  
Holistic Approach ◽  
Quality Data ◽  
Integrated Modelling ◽  
Integrated Analysis ◽  
Urban Water ◽  
Water Quality Data ◽  
Urban Catchments

In the past three decades, scientific research has focused on the preservation of water resources, and in particular, on the polluting impact of urban areas on natural water bodies. One approach to this research has involved the development of tools to describe the phenomena that take place on the urban catchment during both wet and dry periods. Research has demonstrated the importance of the integrated analysis of all the transformation phases that characterise the delivery and treatment of urban water pollutants from source to outfall. With this aim, numerous integrated urban drainage models have been developed to analyse the fate of pollution from urban catchments to the final receiving waters, simulating several physical and chemical processes. Such modelling approaches require calibration, and for this reason, researchers have tried to address two opposing needs: the need for reliable representation of complex systems, and the need to employ parsimonious approaches to cope with the usually insufficient, especially for urban sources, water quality data. The present paper discusses the application of a bespoke model to a complex integrated catchment: the Nocella basin (Italy). This system is characterised by two main urban areas served by two wastewater treatment plants, and has a small river as the receiving water body. The paper describes the monitoring approach that was used for model calibration, presents some interesting considerations about the monitoring needs for integrated modelling applications, and provides initial results useful for identifying the most relevant polluting sources.

ChessWatch: Observations on a Citizen Science approach to catchment management.

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Heppell ◽  
Angela Bartlett ◽  
Allen Beechey ◽  
Paul Jennings ◽  
Helena Souteriou
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Local Community ◽  
Public Awareness ◽  
Ecological Status ◽  
High Water ◽  
Quality Data ◽  
Catchment Management ◽  
Water Quality Data ◽  
The Public ◽  
Water Catchments

<p>River Chess is a chalk stream in South East England (UK), under unprecedented pressure from over-abstraction, urbanisation and climate change, which currently fails to meet good ecological status. Citizen Scientists have been active in the catchment for 9 years carrying out riverfly monitoring due chiefly to concerns about water quality and poor fish populations. The River Chess is also a pilot river for a new catchment-based ‘Smarter Water Catchments’ programme run by the region’s wastewater treatment company (Thames Water) which aims to work with local communities and regulators to deliver improvements to the river by tackling multiple challenges together. The community-led ChessWatch project is a part of this initiative, and is designed to raise public awareness of threats to the River Chess and involve the public in river management activities using a sensor network as a platform. In 2018 four water quality sensors were installed in the river to provide stakeholders with real-time water quality data (15-minute intervals) to support catchment management activities. The dataset from the project is intended to support future decision-making in the catchment as part of the five-year ‘Smarter Water Catchments’ approach.</p><p>Our presentation will review the successes and drawbacks of the ChessWatch project to date and examine the challenges of linking the data collected by the project to policy and practice in a catchment with multiple stakeholder groups. We present the results of a participatory mapping exercise held at local community events to capture the public use of, and concerns for, the river revealing concerns for low flows and water quality issues linked to abstraction and runoff. We show how dissolved oxygen, temperature, turbidity, chlorophyll-a and tryptophan measurements made by the sensors are enabling local stakeholders to better understand the threats to the river arising from urban runoff and changing rainfall patterns, and we examine the challenges of data presentation, sharing and usage in an urbanised catchment with high water demand and multiple conflicting interests.</p>

scholarly journals On the value of water quality data and informative flow states in karst modelling

2017 ◽  
Vol 21 (12) ◽  
pp. 5971-5985 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andreas Hartmann ◽  
Juan Antonio Barberá ◽  
Bartolomé Andreo
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Water Resource ◽  
Quality Data ◽  
Model Parameters ◽  
Flow State ◽  
Saturated Flow ◽  
Water Quality Data ◽  
Model Parameter ◽  
Time Period ◽  
Flow States

Abstract. If properly applied, karst hydrological models are a valuable tool for karst water resource management. If they are able to reproduce the relevant flow and storage processes of a karst system, they can be used for prediction of water resource availability when climate or land use are expected to change. A common challenge to apply karst simulation models is the limited availability of observations to identify their model parameters. In this study, we quantify the value of information when water quality data (NO3− and SO42−) is used in addition to discharge observations to estimate the parameters of a process-based karst simulation model at a test site in southern Spain. We use a three-step procedure to (1) confine an initial sample of 500 000 model parameter sets by discharge and water quality observations, (2) identify alterations of model parameter distributions through the confinement, and (3) quantify the strength of the confinement for the model parameters. We repeat this procedure for flow states, for which the system discharge is controlled by the unsaturated zone, the saturated zone, and the entire time period including times when the spring is influenced by a nearby river. Our results indicate that NO3− provides the most information to identify the model parameters controlling soil and epikarst dynamics during the unsaturated flow state. During the saturated flow state, SO42− and discharge observations provide the best information to identify the model parameters related to groundwater processes. We found reduced parameter identifiability when the entire time period is used as the river influence disturbs parameter estimation. We finally show that most reliable simulations are obtained when a combination of discharge and water quality date is used for the combined unsaturated and saturated flow states.

Water quality management in the Crocodile River catchment, Eastern Transvaal, South Africa

1995 ◽  
Vol 32 (5-6) ◽  
pp. 201-208
Author(s):  
P. J. Ashton ◽  
F. C. van Zyl ◽  
R. G. Heath
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Water Quality ◽  
Quality Management ◽  
Water Quality Management ◽  
Quality Data ◽  
Catchment Management ◽  
Land Uses ◽  
Water Quality Data ◽  
River Catchment ◽  
Management Actions

The Crocodile River catchment lies in an area which currently has one of the highest rates of sustained economic growth in South Africa and supports a diverse array of land uses. Water quality management is vital to resource management strategies for the catchment. A Geographic Information System (GIS) was used to display specific catchment characteristics and land uses, supplemented with integrative overlays depicting land-use impacts on surface water resources and the consequences of management actions on downstream water quality. The water quality requirements of each water user group were integrated to optimise the selection of rational management solutions for particular water quality problems. Time-series water quality data and cause-effect relationships were used to evaluate different water supply scenarios. The GIS facilitated the collation, processing and interpretation of the enormous quantity of spatially orientated information required for integrated catchment management.

The role of citizen science as a tool of public information in water quality management in the Brantas catchment, Indonesia

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Reza Pramana ◽  
Schuyler Houser ◽  
Daru Rini ◽  
Maurits Ertsen
Keyword(s):  
Water Quality ◽  
Quality Management ◽  
Citizen Science ◽  
Water Resource ◽  
Water Resource Management ◽  
Water Quality Management ◽  
Data Availability ◽  
Quality Data ◽  
Water Quality Data ◽  
Data Set

<p>Water quality in the rivers and tributaries of the Brantas catchment (about 12.000 km<sup>2</sup>) is deteriorating due to various reasons, including rapid economic development, insufficient domestic water treatment and waste management, and industrial pollution. Various parameters measured by agencies involved in water resource development and management and environmental management consistently demonstrate exceedance of the local water quality standards. Between the different agencies, water quality data are available – intermittently from 2009 until 2019 at 104 locations, but generally on a monthly basis. Still, opportunities to improve data availability are apparent, both to increase the amount and representability of the data sets. The opportunity to expand available data via citizen science is simultaneously an opportunity to provide education on water stewardship and empower citizens to participate in water quality management. We plan to involve people from eight communities living close to the river and researchers from two local universities in a citizen-science campaign. The community members would sample weekly at 10 locations, from upstream to downstream of the catchment. We will use probes and test strips to measure the temperature, electrical conductivity, pH, nitrate, phosphate, ammonia, iron, and dissolved oxygen. The results will potentially be combined with the data from government agencies to construct an integrated water quality data set to improve decision making and the quality of community engagement in water resource management.</p>

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