scholarly journals Financing Watershed Services in the Foothills of the Himalayas

Water ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (7) ◽  
pp. 965 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rajesh Rai ◽  
Priya Shyamsundar ◽  
Mani Nepal ◽  
Laxmi Bhatta

Watershed management is critical for the sustainable supply of clean water to urban centers, particularly in areas of developing countries where large-scale infrastructure projects are costly to implement. In this paper, we discuss the potential for financing improvements in watershed services in the foothills of the Himalayas through Payments for Ecosystem Services. Through the use of a choice experiment to disentangle household preferences, we show that downstream water users are interested in improvements in water quality through source water protection. Households in Dharan municipality are willing to finance watershed management to the extent of USD 118,000 per year. These payments can be used to incentivize upstream households to decrease domestic livestock grazing, change agricultural practices and reduce open defecation to improve the drinking water quality and quantity in downstream areas. The estimated cost of these activities is less than $50,000 per year. Through discussions with local stakeholders, we propose a tri-partite institutional structure to facilitate transactions between downstream and upstream communities and to improve watershed services.

1996 ◽  
Vol 33 (4-5) ◽  
pp. 39-44
Author(s):  
J. Holas ◽  
M. Konvicková

Potential environmental impacts as a result of large-scale farming system in the Czech Republic have created a great deal of concern in recent years. This concern has led to several studies to identify the role of new regulations, directives and other legislative issues in the field of water pollution control. The set of legislative tools related to watershed management policy to promote better agricultural practices is shortly reviewed. The paper emphasises the running water law system amendment with respect to European community water quality regulations.


Check List ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 476 ◽  
Author(s):  
Geoffrey M. Kay ◽  
Damian R. Michael ◽  
Mason Crane ◽  
Sachiko Okada ◽  
Christopher MacGregor ◽  
...  

A large-scale biodiversity monitoring program examining the response of herpetofauna to the Australian Government’s Environmental Stewardship Program is taking place in south-eastern Australia within the critically endangered Box Gum Grassy Woodland vegetation community. Field surveys involve counting reptiles in areas under Environmental Stewardship management. These “Stewardship” areas have been matched with areas managed for primary production (domestic livestock grazing). We list reptiles recorded during surveys conducted between 2010 and 2012. We recorded sixty-nine species from ten families. The list will be useful for workers interested in the zoogeographical distribution of reptiles and amphibians in fragmented agricultural woodland ecosystems.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joost Buurman ◽  
Stefanos Xenarios ◽  
Eduardo Araral ◽  
Corinne Ong

<p>The urbanization trend is an undeniable fact worldwide in large and small cities.  This trend demands the allocation of vast amount of water resources in cities for drinking and sanitation purposes to ensure a sustainable living.  The sufficient and good water quality as well as the provision of adequate wastewater services is a core element for the sustenance of urban centers independently of its scale.</p><p>Many of the water supply and wastewater authorities (WWS) are currently facing major challenges on the continuous and uninterrupted provision of services.  Rapid urbanization, aged infrastructure, water scarcity, poor water quality and network loses are some of the challenges to be currently met.</p><p>The response to many of the above issues demands the increase of operational and maintenance costs that have to be born mostly or entirely by the users. A big debate on the affordability of the urban dwellers to cover the water supply and waste expenditures is currently ongoing.</p><p>The current study will assess the affordability of water users in urban centers to cover the basic consumption and secure a minimum amount of water.  Also, the study will investigate water affordability indicators among different cities for the sustainable operation of the WWS in 21<sup>st</sup> century.</p><p>We will assess 5 different type of urban types to better capture the water affordability trends at large. Namely, the following types will be assessed a) New cities with rapid urbanization b) Old cities with existent aged network c) Water scarce cities with difficulty to access water sources d) Hazard prone cities with high vulnerability on water-risk problems e) Water sufficient cities, which however take measures on securitization of water resources. Examples from developing and developed countries will be drawn to examine the affordability issue in context specific and case-specific studies.</p>


Author(s):  
Heather L. Welch ◽  
Christopher T. Green ◽  
Richard A. Rebich ◽  
Jeannie R.B. Barlow ◽  
Matthew B. Hicks

Author(s):  
I. Saakian ◽  
Aleksandr, Grigor’ev ◽  
E. Kravets ◽  
E. Rudakov ◽  
A. Faddeev ◽  
...  

Выполнен анализ действующей редакции Методики разработки нормативов допустимых сбросов веществ и микроорганизмов в водные объекты для водопользователей , утвержденной приказом Минприроды России от 17 декабря 2007 г. 333, на предмет непротиворечивости и соответствия нормам водоохранного законодательства. Выявлена неопределенность применения Методики в условиях воздействия на качество воды природных и антропогенных факторов, не зависящих от конкретного водопользователя. Положения Методики противоречат принципам нормирования воздействия на водные объекты на основе наилучших доступных технологий, что было показано на примерах утвержденных технологических показателей содержания загрязняющих веществ в сточных водах различных отраслей промышленности. Анализ системы нормирования допустимых воздействий на водные объекты и географической дифференциации нормативов качества воды в пределах Российской Федерации вместе с системой целевых показателей качества воды также показал несоответствие Методики основным принципам водоохранного законодательства.The analysis of the current edition of the Methods of developing standards for permissible discharges of substances and microorganisms into water bodies for water users , approved by the Order of the Ministry of Natural Resources of Russia dated December 17, 2007 No. 333 for consilience and compliance with the regulations of the water protection legislation, is carried out. Uncertainty of the application of the Methods in the conditions of the impact of natural and anthropogenic factors that are independent of a specific water user on the quality of water has been identified. The provisions of the Methods contradict the principles of regulating the impact on water bodies based on the best available technologies shown on the examples of approved process indicators of the concentrations of various industrial pollutants in wastewater. An analysis of the system of regulating the permissible impact on water bodies and the geographical differentiation of water quality standards within the boundaries of the Russian Federation, together with the system of water quality targets, also showed that the Methods do not comply with the basic principles of the water protection legislation.


2011 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 481-489
Author(s):  
S. Krause ◽  
A. Obermayer

The public drinking water supply of southern Germany is characterized by a rather decentralized network. Due to the hydrogeological setting in these parts of Germany many of the small water works with an average capacity of 50 m3/h have to treat raw water extracted from karstic or cliffy aquifers. These raw waters tend to be contaminated with particles and pathogens acquired during snowmelt or after strong rainfalls. In the last decade ultrafiltration has become the technology of choice for the removal of the aforementioned contaminants. Flux decline caused by unanticipated membrane fouling is the main limitation for the application of ultrafiltration membranes. This paper describes how membrane fouling phenomena can be predicted by using a statistical approach based on data from large scale filtration systems in combination with field and lab experiments on raw water quality and membrane performance. The data defines water quality and respective fouling phenomena both in technical scale filtration plants and in lab experiments of eleven different raw waters. The method described here is more economically feasible for small water works when compared to typical pilot experiments that are used for high capacity water works.


1995 ◽  
Vol 31 (8) ◽  
pp. 197-205 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. L. Bijlmakers ◽  
E. O. A. M. de Swart

For the area of the Ronde Venen a plan for large-scale wetland-restoration and improvement of the water quality was developed. Major elements of the developed spatial strategy are the optimal use of the specific hydrological and ecological characteristics of the area. Based on regional hydrological characteristics within the study area hydrological sub-units were distinguished by connecting discharge and recharge areas. In this way the intake of polluted surface water from outside the area could be minimized, with an optimal use of specific local differences in water quality. Two scenarios were developed and evaluated using hydrological, hydrochemical and ecological models. The scenarios differed in spatial composition and the way the water level was manipulated. In order to optimize water quality, natural and artificial pollution control mechanisms were implemented as well. An important criterion for the evaluation was the extent to which the scenarios succeeded in optimizing conditions for the realization of the ecological goals. The most promising and acceptable scenario has been worked out in further detail.


Author(s):  
Takeshi Mizunoya ◽  
Noriko Nozaki ◽  
Rajeev Kumar Singh

AbstractIn the early 2000s, Japan instituted the Great Heisei Consolidation, a national strategy to promote large-scale municipal mergers. This study analyzes the impact that this strategy could have on watershed management. We select the Lake Kasumigaura Basin, the second largest lake in Japan, for the case study and construct a dynamic expanded input–output model to simulate the ecological system around the Lake, the socio-environmental changes over the period, and their mutual dependency for the period 2012–2020. In the model, we regulate and control the following water pollutants: total nitrogen, total phosphorus, and chemical oxygen demand. The results show that a trade-off between economic activity and the environment can be avoided within a specific range of pollution reduction, given that the prefectural government implements optimal water environment policies, assuming that other factors constraining economic growth exist. Additionally, municipal mergers are found to significantly reduce the budget required to improve the water environment, but merger budget efficiency varies nonlinearly with the reduction rate. Furthermore, despite the increase in financial efficiency from the merger, the efficiency of installing domestic wastewater treatment systems decreases drastically beyond a certain pollution reduction level and eventually reaches a limit. Further reductions require direct regulatory instruments in addition to economic policies, along with limiting the output of each industry. Most studies on municipal mergers apply a political, administrative, or financial perspective; few evaluate the quantitative impact of municipal mergers on the environment and environmental policy implications. This study addresses these gaps.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document