Hydraulic Engineering Commons^™

A Validated Tropical-Extratropical Flood Hazard Assessment For New York Harbor, Philip M. Orton, T. M. Hall, Stefan A. Talke, Alan F. Blumberg, Nickitas Georgas, S. Vinogradov

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Recent studies of flood risk at New York Harbor (NYH) have shown disparate results for the 100 year storm tide, providing an uncertain foundation for the flood mitigation response after Hurricane Sandy. Here we present a flood hazard assessment that improves confidence in our understanding of the region's present-day potential for flooding, by separately including the contribution of tropical cyclones (TCs) and extratropical cyclones (ETCs), and validating our modeling study at multiple stages against historical observations. The TC assessment is based on a climatology of 606 synthetic storms developed from a statistical-stochastic model of North Atlantic TCs. The ETC assessment …

Hydraulic And Hydrologic Properties Of The Sabine River, Annie L. Bryant

Civil Engineering Theses

The Sabine River is located in Northeast Texas and is home to many threatened and endangered species as well as a growing human population. It is important to understand channel properties and flow characteristics of rivers in order better manage these important natural resources. The Sabine was monitored for hydraulic and hydrological properties as this is a poorly understood river at this point in time.

Hydraulic modeling was conducted to determine channel velocities and shear stresses during different storm frequencies. It was found that velocity and shear stress had a direct relationship at lower velocities. A comparison of existing Geographic …

Lucidpipe™ Power System, Purdue Ect Team

ECT Fact Sheets

In most gravity fed water transmission pipelines, it is desired to reduce excess pressure head to prevent undue strain on a pipeline and lower the incidence of leaks. Normally this is done with pressure reducing valves that essentially burn off this excess pressure as heat. The LucidPipe™ system converts it to low cost electricity thereby removing unwanted pressure and generating energy at the same time - energy that can be put used behind the grid or put back on the grid. The LucidPipe™ system extracts a small percentage of pressure head providing nearly invisible operation allowing water operators to fulfill …

Exploring The Influence Of Urban Watershed Characteristics And Antecedent Climate On In-Stream Pollutant Dynamics, Laurel Elizabeth Christian

Masters Theses

Understanding pollutant fate and transport in urban watersheds is a challenging endeavor, as heterogeneity of land use, precipitation patterns, and pollutant loadings add complexity to the system. As a result, many currently utilized water quality models exhibit poor performance. One main challenge in urban system modeling is the lack of quality data sets for model development, calibration, and testing, resulting in the need for high quality data collection. Although recent studies have begun to investigate pollutant transport in urban watersheds to aid these models, these studies have focused primarily on the end-of-pipe as the point of interest (i.e. prior to …

Benchmark Levels For The Consumptive Water Footprint Of Crop Production For Different Environmental Conditions: A Case Study For Winter Wheat In China, La Zhuo, Mesfin Mekonnen, Arjen Y. Hoekstra

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute: Faculty Publications

Meeting growing food demands while simultaneously shrinking the water footprint (WF) of agricultural production is one of the greatest societal challenges. Benchmarks for the WF of crop production can serve as a reference and be helpful in setting WF reduction targets. The consumptive WF of crops, the consumption of rainwater stored in the soil (green WF), and the consumption of irrigation water (blue WF) over the crop growing period varies spatially and temporally depending on environmental factors like climate and soil. The study explores which environmental factors should be distinguished when determining benchmark levels for the consumptive WF of crops. …

Channel Form And Processes In A Formerly Glaciated Terrain, Nathaniel Bergman

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Despite that many places around the world in general, and North America in particular, were glaciated during the last ice age, relatively little is known about rivers that evolved over these landscapes once they deglaciated. These rivers are commonly categorized as alluvial with a glacial legacy, and often described as plain gravel-bed or sand-bed rivers. Alternatively, they are considered to be bedrock rivers when the glacial deposits were eroded and underlying rock was exposed. However, ignoring the glacial history of these rivers is scientifically wrong and they should be termed "semi-alluvial". This work shows that classification is important, not only …

A Consideration Of Hydraulic Fracturing In The United States, Sarah Wagner

Student Writing

No abstract provided.

Evaluating The Mechanisms Of Erosion For Coarse-Grained Materials, Maureen K. Corcoran, Ghada Ellithy, Michael K. Sharp, Johannes L. Wibowo

Publications

Efforts are currently underway by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) to perform a risk assessment of all dams and levees within their portfolio. The vast majority of that portfolio is earthen structures. Findings from the assessments have shown that the major risk drivers for these earth structures are related to erosion (internal and external), overtopping, poorly designed and constructed intrusions (such as pipe crossings), and other factors to a lesser degree (such as burrowing animals). Therefore, the USACE is currently investigating several of these failure modes with emphasis on internal and external erosion. This paper will highlight efforts …

Propuesta Metodológica Para El Diagnóstico De Sistemas De Abastecimiento De Energía Eléctrica, Y Agua Con Enfoque A La Producción Agrícola En El Sector Rural, Natalia Alejandra Perilla Sarmiento, Santiago Andres Torres Jara

Ingeniería Civil

No abstract provided.

Asbestos Cement Pipe Condition Assessment And Remaining Service Life Prediction, Abiy Melles Ghirmay

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research details a condition assessment of asbestos cement (AC) pipe within in the Bella Vista Village Property Owners Association water distribution system. Bella Vista Village contains appropriately 300 miles of AC pipe with nominal diameters from 6-14 inch. The goal of the research is to determine the current condition of AC pipe within the system and predict future performance of the pipes. AC pipe samples were obtained from 23 locations disturbed across the distribution system with nominal pipe diameters of 6-8 inch. Estimates of current level of degradation were obtained using phenolphthalein staining and hardness measurements of each sample. …

Estudio De La Eficiencia En Desarenadores Ligados A Un Nivel De Complejidad Mediante Un Modelo Físico A Escala Reducida, Fabio Hernan Fiesco Gorrón, Harold Andrés Arias Acosta

Ingeniería Civil

No abstract provided.

Laboratory And Full Boom-Based Investigation Of Nozzle Setup And Restriction Effects On Flow, Pressure And Spray Pattern Distribution, Shane H. Forney

Department of Agricultural and Biological Systems Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Pesticide application is an integral part of crop production and ground-based agricultural boom sprayers are used extensively to apply pesticides to the crop canopy or soil surface across millions of acres in the United States. Efficient application is necessary to minimize costs and limit adverse environmental impacts. Errors in flow rate and system pressure measurements may cause as-applied maps to incorrectly indicate application rates and could negatively affect downstream data processing or analysis. The goals of this study were to provide quantified measurements on the effects of nozzle setup errors on spray pattern uniformity and evaluate how laboratory patternator data …

Trend Analysis Of Water Quality In Northwest Arkansas Streams Reflects Changes In The Watershed, Zachary Paul Simpson

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Watershed export of nutrients, sediments, and chemicals impacts receiving waters. Changes within the watershed (e.g., anthropogenic or climatic) can alter the transport of constituents in streams. Stream monitoring is crucial for understanding these effects. This study developed a potential improvement to flow-adjusting constituent concentrations in streams, an important step of analyzing monitoring data in lotic systems for trends. The method incorporates a K-fold cross-validation procedure to optimize a model explaining the relationship between the concentration and streamflow, thus providing a valuable tool to researchers in water quality. Additionally, two case studies were conducted on watersheds located in northwest Arkansas using …

Evaluating A Measure-Calculate Method For Determining Sediment Oxygen Demand In Lakes, Adrian Beirise

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A steady-state mass diffusion model used with simple measurable and calculable inputs for determining sediment oxygen demand (SOD) is compared to an intact core incubation (ICI) SOD method using samples from three lakes. The mass diffusion model coupled with inputs is known as the measure-calculate method (M-C) and is a potential alternative to existing methods for measuring SOD which are more complex, time-consuming, and costly. The M-C method requires inputs for volumetric sediment oxygen uptake (Ṅsed), sediment density and porosity, and water properties. Ṅsed was determined by suspending sediment in oxygen-saturated water with a DO probe and determining the steady …

Electrodeionization Versus Electrodialysis: A Clean-Up Of Produced Water In Hydraulic Fracturing, Brigitte Marie Rodgers

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Electrodeionization (EDI) is a widely studied process ranging from applications in wastewater clean-up in the food and beverage industry to purifying organic compounds. To date, there are no apparent studies on applying this technology to produced wastewater recovered from hydraulic fracking sites. Water consumption within hydraulic fracturing sites can reach in the upwards of millions of gallons per site, so a need for a water recycling process becomes necessary within areas where water requirements are scarce. Implementation of an EDI module that is capable of handling high salt solutions from produced wastewater in subsequent fracturing practices will decrease overall water …

Experimental Investigation Of Discharge Capacity Of Labyrinth Weirs With And Without Nappe Breakers, Omer Bilhan, Emin Emiroglu, Carol J. Miller

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research Publications

Labyrinth weirs provide higher discharge capacity than conventional weirs, with the ability to pass large flows at comparatively low heads. Labyrinth weirs are primarily used as spillways for dams where the spillway width is restricted. In recent years, many research investigations have considered the hydraulic performance of labyrinth weirs, particularly as dependent on the geometric features. The previous work has improved the design basis for such weirs. However, their design still requires experimentally derived and generalized performance curves. It is especially important to observe the behavior of the weir nappe to ensure the design provides hydraulic optimization and to account …

Development And Assessment Of A Groundwater Sustainability Index In Climatically Diverse Groundwater Irrigated Regions In Nebraska, Maria A. Mulet Jalil

Department of Agricultural and Biological Systems Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The aim of this research was to evaluate the impact of regional change in ET on groundwater level changes and the assessment and development of a groundwater sustainability index for climatically diverse regions across Nebraska during 2000-2014. Irrigation in the selected regions is predominantly supplied by groundwater. The hypothesis is that groundwater use can become sustainable if the regional evapotranspiration (ET) is managed so that it equals the ET of vegetation that is native to the region. Site locations were Box Butte, Chase, Dundy, Holt LNNRD and York Counties and 3 ecosystems were evaluated: native vegetation, dryland and irrigated cropping …

Fire-Spotting Modelling And Parametrisation For Wild-Land Fires, Inderpreet Kaur, Gianni Pagnini

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

This article describes a mathematical formulation for simulating the effects of firebrands on the propagation of the wild-land fires. Among the different approaches available in literature, this formulation is defined in a way to provide a versatile approach for application to operational wildfire models. Most of the operational wildfire models like WRF-SFIRE and ForeFire model only the evolution of the fire-line according to the definition of the rate of spread, fuel characterisation and the average fire properties and concurrent atmospheric conditions. But this information is not enough to simulate the effects of turbulence and fire-spotting. The formulation presented here can …

A Generator Of Landuse Application For Complex And Heterogeneous Agricultural Practices, Odile Leccia-Phelpin, Jean-Marie Lescot, Françoise Vernier

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Non-point source pollution from agriculture has become a major concern for water managers and institutional stakeholders. To reduce diffuse pollution, agricultural conservation measures are widely used with efficiency. On non-monitored territories environmental modelling enables the assessment of their long term impacts on water and soils and to evaluate land-use change scenarios. We developed an innovative Generator of Landuse (GenLU) application in order to build up multi-year spatial crop successions from identified crop rotations with their related management schedule s. GenLU can be used solely for generating landuse or coupled with the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model so as …

Water Supply System Classification For Water Quality Improvement, Bruno Melo Brentan, Gustavo Meirelles Lima, Edevar Luvizotto Junior, Joaquín Izquierdo, Rafael Pérez-García

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Universal access to drinkable water is a constitutional right guaranteed in Brazil. However, not all cities in this country are able to supply the population with the expected quality. Important actions should be taken to improve the supply of drinkable water. To define a strategic plan for this purpose, classification tools can facilitate the design of plans, by grouping cities with similar quality conditions. During the last decades, neural network approaches have been used in environmental models, allowing more accurate representation of some complex systems. This work proposes the use of self-organizing maps (SOM’s) coupled with the k-means algorithm …

Optimal Land Use?! – A Review On Optimization Techniques Used In Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis, Andrea Kaim, Anna Cord, Martin Volk

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Agriculture, forest management, conservation planning and other related disciplines have specific land use demands, and thus different perspectives on how land should be used in an “optimal way”. One way to solve arising land use conflicts is employing the ecosystem services concept together with methods from the field of multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA). Especially optimization techniques provide the possibility to include socio-economic and ecological aspects as well as the protection of biodiversity. In this study, we give an overview of these methods, focusing especially on their application in agricultural areas. We explore their abilities for the identification of ecosystem service …

Data-Driven Wildfire Behaviour Modelling: Application Of Firefly To Field-Scale Grassland Controlled Burns, M. C. Rochoux, C. Zhang, D. Lucor, S. Ricci, A. Trouve

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Assessing epistemic uncertainties is now considered as a milestone for improving numerical predictions of a dynamically evolving system. The objective of this project is to demonstrate the benefits of data assimilation combined with sensor observations of the fire front position to both quantify and reduce the uncertainties in wildfire behaviour forecasting capability. The challenges found on the route to modelling wildfire behaviour are two-fold. There is the modelling challenge associated with providing accurate representations of the multi-scale multi-physics processes governing wildfire dynamics. There is also the data challenge associated with providing accurate estimates of the environmental conditions (biomass moisture, near-surface …

Atlas: A Tool To Model Spatial-Temporal Dynamics Of Processes Influencing Ecosystem Services, Hugo Thierry, Aude Vialatte, Claude Monteil, Annie Ouin

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Biodiversity provides various benefits to humankind throughout what is defined as ecosystem services. Within a specific ecosystem, a wide range of ecosystem services can be identified. During the past decades, human intervention has aimed to increase some services such as food production through agricultural intensification, at the expense of other services such as water regulation. Mapping, evaluating and quantifying each of these ecosystem services provided by biodiversity to crop production could help to increase the multi-functionality of agricultural landscapes. In this context, we developed a spatially-explicit model called ATLAS (AgriculTural LandscApe Simulator). ATLA …

Understanding The Relationships Between Sanitation And Health In Nicaragua And Honduras, Through Data Mining Tools, Ginevra Marina Lazerini, Josep Nualart, Sergio Ruiz-Cayuela, Maialen Urbina, Miquel Sànchez Marrè, Karina Gibert

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The aim of this work is to analyze water and sanitation supply data from Nicaragua and Honduras by using different data mining tools. The data has been provided by SIASAR (Rural Water and Sanitation Information System), which is a water and sanitation management and information platform created through the joint effort of different Central American Governments and the World Bank. In the study data from a survey performed in all the rural communities in Nicaragua and in a sample of the rural communities in Honduras from 2012 to 2015 is analyzed. Database contains 10206 communities described by 23 numerical variables …

Resilience Of Punta S’Aliga Barrier Beach To Storm Impacts, Andrea Sulis

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Beach and dune provide natural defense against erosion and flooding, and associated mitigation measures are classical coastal engineering problems studied by many researchers. Winter storms cause severe erosion leading to dune breaching and then flooding of the hinterland areas. Resiliency of a barrier beach depends on the ability of the dune (resistor) to recover in height and extent following storms. Whereas erosion of the beach and dune occurs over hours and days, it can be years to decades before the beach and dune are able to recover to their pre-storm state. In the last two decades, numerical modelling methods have …

The Economics Of Agricultural Water Productivity In The Blue Nile, Imeshi Weerasinghe, James Booker, Wim Bastiaanssen, Lisa-Marie Rebelo, Ann Van Griensven

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Agricultural Water Productivity (AWP) is often simplified as the ‘crop per drop’, described as the output in terms of yield or biomass per unit of water input. This purely physical measure of Water Productivity (WP) using only a single factor input (water) does not consider: (1) the level of other inputs used in conjunction with water, (2) the opportunity cost of water as an input, (3) the value of the output and (4) the costs of production for different crops. This study presents a justification and methodology for incorporating these factors into WP indicators. The application of these extensions to …

E3.Pt – An E3 Portabledyme Model For Portugal, Anett Großmann, Frank Hohmann

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

E3 models are environmentally extended economic models. They are extensively used for impact assessment of energy, climate and resource policies at national and international level. E3 models have proven to be suitable tools for quantifying effects on the economy, environment and energy system. Usually, the structure and documentation of such models are only accessible by the model builders. They are facing the allegation to be a "black box" meaning that only their creators are able to operate and fully understand the model system. Decision makers are often only engaged at the end of the model building process to discuss the …

A Markov Decision Process Model To Compare Ecosystem Services Provided By Agricultural Landscapes, Sabrina Gaba, Nathalie Peyrard, Régis Sabbadin, Julia Radoszyckic

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

One current challenge in managing agricultural landscapes, is to reach a trade-off between provision of food and biodiversity conservation. Two extreme land-use strategies, land sharing and land sparing, are often discussed. The design of decision rules for allocating crops and lands for biodiversity conservation (e.g. grasslands) can be formalized as an optimization problem. However the target to optimize, representing the trade-off between ecosystem services (ES) can be complex to model since ES are usually not defined on comparable scales and may rely on different sides of biodiversity. Here, we will investigate how landscape composition and structure affect the magnitude of …

Sectorization Of Intermittent Water Supply Networks Based On Graph Theory And Clustering Techniques, Amilkar E. Ilaya-Ayza, David Ayala-Cabrera, Joaquín Izquierdo, Enrique Campbell, Rafael Pérez-García

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Intermittent water supply is the form of access to water in many countries around the world. It is very common that design, operation, maintenance and, in general, decision-making in these systems are performed using tools originally developed for systems with continuous supply, which are not adequate. However, these tools can be reasonably applied to network sectorization of intermittent supply networks. We propose a sectorization methodology for networks that do not have the possibility of working with continuous supply. In addition, to ensure sufficient pressure, sector design must guarantee equity in the supply. Furthermore, it is not enough to establish sector …

A Mathematical Model For Ghg From Sb-Mbr: Calibration By An Innovative Protocol, Giorgio Mannina, Alida Cosenza

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

A mathematical model to quantify greenhouse gases (GHG) (carbon dioxide, CO₂ and nitrous oxide, N₂O) for a membrane bioreactor (MBR) is presented. The model has been applied to a pilot plant with a pre-denitrification MBR scheme. The pilot plant was cyclically filled with real saline wastewater according to the fill-draw-batch operation. The model was calibrated by adopting a specific protocol based on extensive field dataset. Standardised Regression Coefficient (SRC) method was adopted to select the most influential model factors to be calibrated. Results related to SRC method show that among the important model factors a key role …