Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

2014 Aquatic Weed Surveys In Timothy Lake, Lake Harriet, North Fork Reservoir, Faraday Lake, And Estacada Lake, Rich Miller, Mark D. Sytsma, Jeffrey Thomas Brittain

Center for Lakes and Reservoirs Publications and Presentations

The Clackamas River Hydroelectric Project No. 2195 (Project) is located on the Oak Grove Fork of the Clackamas River and the mainstem of the Clackamas River in Clackamas County, Oregon. Reservoirs included in the Project include Timothy Lake, Lake Harriet, North Fork Reservoir, Faraday Lake, and Estacada Lake. The operator of the Project, Portland General Electric (PGE), was issued a license on December 21, 2010 by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) for continued operations and maintenance. The Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS) for the license noted that regular surveys for invasive aquatic weed species would be conducted as part …

Physical, Chemical And Biological Assessment Of Yoncalla Log Ponds, Rich Miller, Mark D. Sytsma, Angela L. Strecker

Center for Lakes and Reservoirs Publications and Presentations

The Yoncalla Log Ponds are a series of four ponds located in within the city limits of the town in Yoncalla in northern Douglas County, Oregon. The ponds were created in stages between the late 1930s and the 1950s and used for log storage through the 1970s (North Douglas Betterment 2014). North Douglas Betterment purchased the land surrounding the ponds and contracted with the Center for Lakes and Reservoirs at Portland State University to assess the current morphometry, vegetation and water quality status of the ponds and provide recommendations for management of the aquatic vegetation. The scope of this document …

Efficacy Of Plastic Mesh Tubes In Reducing Herbivory Damage By The Invasive Nutria (Myocastor Coypus) In An Urban Restoration Site, Trevor R. Sheffels, Mark D. Sytsma, Jacoby Carter, Jimmy D. Taylor

Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

The restoration of stream corridors is becoming an increasingly important component of urban landscape planning, and the high cost of these projects necessitates the need to understand and address potential ecological obstacles to project success. The nutria (Myocastor coypus) is an invasive, semi-aquatic rodent native to South America that causes detrimental ecological impacts in riparian and wetland habitats throughout its introduced range, and techniques are needed to reduce nutria herbivory damage to urban stream restoration projects. We assessed the efficacy of standard Vexar® plastic mesh tubes in reducing nutria herbivory damage to newly established woody plants. The study was conducted …

Implementation Of A Sediment Transport Model For Ce-Qual-W2, Rachel Hanna

Civil and Environmental Engineering Master's Project Reports

The CE-QUAL-W2 model, developed by Portland State University, simulates water quality and flow. Recommendations to expand on this model and have it include sediment transport are implemented in this report. Existing one-, two-, and three-dimensional models are reviewed and assessed for their sediment transport methodology. A laterally (width) averaged sediment concentration model is developed as an Upwind Center Space Scheme using CE-QUAL-W2 data. The scheme includes a method to calculate scour for sediment concentration and results of the model are shown for a simulated branch of the Spokane River.

The Atmosphere Can Be A Source Of Certain Water Soluble Volatile Organic Compounds In Urban Streams, Scott J. Kenner, David A. Bender, James F. Pankow, John S. Zogorski

Chemistry Faculty Publications and Presentations

Surface water and air volatile organic compound (VOC) data from 10 U. S. Geological Survey monitoring sites were used to evaluate the potential for direct transport of VOCs from the atmosphere to urban streams. Analytical results of 87 VOC compounds were screened by evaluating the occurrence and detection levels in both water and air, and equilibrium concentrations in water (C-w(s)) based on the measured air concentrations. Four compounds (acetone, methyl tertiary butyl ether, toluene, and m- & p-xylene) were detected in more than 20% of water samples, in more than 10% of air samples, and more than 10% of detections …

Investigating The Link Between Surface Water And Groundwater In The Tule Lake Subbasin, Oregon And California, Esther Maria Pischel

Dissertations and Theses

Water allocation in the upper Klamath Basin of Oregon and California has been challenging. Irrigators have increasingly turned to groundwater to make up for surface water shortages because of shifts in allocation toward in-stream flows for Endangered Species Act listed fishes. The largest increase in groundwater pumping has been in and around the Bureau of Reclamation's Klamath Irrigation Project, which includes the Tule Lake subbasin in the southern part of the upper Klamath Basin. Previous groundwater flow model simulations indicate that water level declines from pumping may result in decreased flow to agricultural drains in the Tule Lake subbasin. Agricultural …

Analysis Of Landsat Satellite Data To Monitor Water Quality Parameters In Tenmile Lake, Oregon, Michael T. Waxter

Civil and Environmental Engineering Master's Project Reports

The health of North and South Tenmile Lakes in coastal Oregon has declined since the introduction of invasive species of fish and plant life in the 1920s. The lakes are now on the Federal Clean Water Act list of impaired water bodies due, in part, to a lack of dissolved oxygen and Hazardous Algae Blooms (HAB) blooms that occur during June through September. In this report we discuss the possibility of detecting and monitoring these blooms using satellite measurements of water surface color. In-situ measurements obtained from the Tenmile Lakes Basin Partnership were used to calibrate reflectance from the Thematic …

Assessing Hydrologic And Water Quality Sensitivities To Precipitation Changes, Urban Growth And Land Management Using Swat, Alexander Michael Psaris

Dissertations and Theses

Precipitation changes and urban growth are two factors altering the state of water quality. Changes in precipitation will alter the amount and timing of flows, and the corresponding sediment and nutrient dynamics. Meanwhile, densification associated with urban growth will create more impervious surfaces which will alter sediment and nutrient loadings. Land and water managers often rely on models to develop possible future scenarios and devise management responses to these projected changes. We use the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) to assess the sensitivities of stream flow, sediment, and nutrient loads in two urbanizing watersheds in Northwest Oregon, USA to …

Relationships Between Environmental Governance And Water Quality In A Growing Metropolitan Area Of The Pacific Northwest, Usa, Heejun Chang, Paul R. Thiers, Noelwah R. Netusil, J. Alan Yeakley, Gretchen Rollwagen-Bollens, Steve Bollens, Sonia Singh

Geography Faculty Publications and Presentations

We investigate relationships between environmental governance and water quality in two adjacent growing metropolitan areas in the western US. While the Portland, Oregon and Vancouver, Washington metro areas share many common biophysical characteristics, they have different land development histories and water governance structures, providing a unique opportunity for examining how differences in governance might affect environmental quality. We conceptualize possible linkages in which water quality influences governance directly, using monitoring efforts as a metric, and indirectly by using the change in the sale price of single-family residential properties. Governance may then influence water quality directly through riparian restoration resulting from …

Household Water Demand And Land Use Context: A Multilevel Approach, Elizabeth Yancey Breyer

Dissertations and Theses

Urban water use arises from a mix of scale-dependent biophysical and socioeconomic factors. In Portland, Oregon, single-family residential water use exhibits a tightly coupled relationship with summertime weather, although this relationship varies with land use patterns across households and neighborhoods. This thesis developed a multilevel regression model to evaluate the relative importance of weather variability, parcel land use characteristics, and neighborhood geographic context in explaining single-family residential water demand patterns in the Portland metropolitan area. The model drew on a high-resolution panel dataset of weekly mean summer water use over five years (2001-2005) for a sample of 460 single-family households …

Osmb Final Report, Task 7: Online Atlas Of Oregon Lakes - Aquatic Invasive Species Interface, Rich Miller, Mark D. Sytsma

Center for Lakes and Reservoirs Publications and Presentations

In order to educate a broad cross section of the public about Aquatic Invasive Species (AIS) distributions and survey efforts in Oregon’s lakes and reservoirs, database connections were created to display AIS information on the Online Atlas of Oregon Lakes (aol.research.pdx.edu/). The connections allowed for the dynamic display of AIS survey records stored in three separate databases: the Center for Lakes and Reservoir’s Oregon Aquatic Plant and Mussel Databases and the iMapInvasives database. AIS survey records collected by the Center for Lakes and Reservoirs were also reported to the iMapInvasives database.

Osmb Final Report, Task 4: Oregon Lake Watch, Angela L. Strecker, Rich Miller, Vanessa Morgan

Center for Lakes and Reservoirs Publications and Presentations

The Oregon Lake Watch (OLW) volunteer monitoring program was resurrected after over a decade in hibernation. The new program was designed to educate the public about threats of aquatic invasive species (AIS), provide early detection of AIS invasions, and provide long term water quality data for the better management of Oregon’s lakes and reservoirs. Protocols were created for citizen scientists to survey for AIS, collect temperature and water clarity data, and record the data through an online data entry portal. An OLW website was developed to educate about AIS and provide survey protocols and identification materials to volunteers. AIS surveys …

Modelling Rainwater-Harvesting System Reliability Based On Historical Precipitation Data For Portland, Mrinali Mathur

Civil and Environmental Engineering Master's Project Reports

Rainwater harvesting can ease the water availability problems for many parts of the world where water is not easily available. It is also a solution for minimizing stormwater runoff and better managing sewers by preventing combined sewers to overflow. The goal of this project is to calculate the reliability of rainwater harvesting systems and provide optimum size of the storage tank using historical records for Portland specific rain pattern. A simple water balance approach for historical data is used to calculate the reliability by which rainwater harvesting system can be used as a means of irrigating gardens in Portland. The …

Streamflow Modeling Of Johnson Creek Subwatersheds Using The Precipitation Runoff Modeling System, Theophilus Matthew Malone

Civil and Environmental Engineering Master's Project Reports

Johnson Creek, in the Portland, Oregon metropolitan region, has several pollutants on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) 303(d) list including excess heat, low dissolved oxygen, and harmful bacteria. Understanding streamflow response to precipitation events is an important component to evaluating water quality trends and calculating the Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) for pollutants of concern. Investigating the streamflow-precipitation relationship on the subwatershed scale can give insight to the hydrologic response of a given watershed. However, developing rating curves for several subwatersheds can be cost and time prohibitive. The objective of this project was to develop a hydrologic model using …

Lifeblood Of The Earth: Nuwuvi (Southern Paiute) Hydrological Knowledge And Perceptions Of Restoration In Two Southern Nevada Protected Areas, Kendra Lesley Wendel

Dissertations and Theses

In the arid landscapes of the southern Great Basin and northern Mojave Desert, issues surrounding water resource management are often politically contentious. Nuwuvi (Southern Paiute) have known and managed these resources for thousands of years prior to Euro-American arrival in the region. A variety of factors, including federal policies that resulted in the creation of reservations and forced placement in boarding schools, as well as contemporary resource commodification, have influenced Nuwuvi knowledge and practice.

In this thesis, I examined the character of Nuwuvi ethnohydrological knowledge, including management knowledge, of two protected areas: Spring Mountains National Recreation Area (SMNRA), managed by …

Diverted Opportunity: Inequality And What The Southnorth Water Transfer Project Really Means For China, Britt Crow-Miller

Institute for Sustainable Solutions Publications and Presentations

The article discusses China’s South-North Water Transfer Project (SNWTP) and argues that not only does the SNWTP reflect existing spatially articulated power discrepancies, but it reinforces and potentially exacerbates those inequalities by prioritizing Beijing’s present and future water needs above those of its neighbors and locking them in place for decades to come. Smaller, regional cities and rural areas — Shijiazhuang and Baoding in Hebei, Nanyang in Henan and the gritty, struggling towns and villages around Danjiangkou Reservoir — might have gained muchneeded jobs and government investment in the short term around the construction of the Middle Route, but without …

Riparian Vegetation Assemblages And Associated Landscape Factors Across An Urbanizing Metropolitan Area, Christa Von Behren, Andrew Evans Dietrich, J. Alan Yeakley

Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

While diverse, native riparian vegetation provides important functions, it remains unclear to what extent these assemblages can persist in urban areas, and under what conditions. We characterized forested riparian vegetation communities across an urbanizing metropolitan area and examined their relationships with surrounding land cover. We hypothesized that native and hydrophilic species assemblages would correlate with forest cover in the landscape. For each of 30 sites in the Portland–Vancouver metro area, we recorded vegetation at 1-cm intervals along 3 transects using the line-intercept method. Land cover was characterized at 2 scales: within 500 m of each site and across the entire …

Phenotypic Plasticity Of Invasive Spartina Densiflora (Poaceae) Along A Broad Latitudinal Gradient On The Pacific Coast Of North America, Jesus M. Castillo, Brenda J. Grewall, Andrea Pickart, Alejandro Bortolus, Carlos Pena, Enrique Figueroa, Mark D. Sytsma

Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

Premise of the study: Phenotypic acclimation of individual plants and genetic differentiation by natural selection within invasive populations are two potential mechanisms that may confer fitness advantages and allow plants to cope with environmental variation. The invasion of Spartina densiflora across a wide latitudinal gradient from California (USA) to British Columbia (Canada) provides a natural model system to study the potential mechanisms underlying the response of invasive populations to substantial variation in climate and other environmental variables.

Methods: We examined morphological and physiological leaf traits of Spartina densiflora plants in populations from invaded estuarine sites across broad latitudinal and climate …

Convergent Surface Water Distributions In U.S. Cities, Meredith K. Steele, James B. Heffernan, Neil D. Bettez, Jeannine Cavender-Bares, Peter M. Groffman, J. Morgan Grove, Sharon J. Hall, Sarah E. Hobbie, Kelli L. Larson, Jennifer L. Morse, Christopher Neill, Kristen C. Nelson, Jarlath O'Neil-Dunne, Laura A. Ogden, Diane E. Pataki, Colin Polsky, Rinku Roy Chowdhury

Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

Earth's surface is rapidly urbanizing, resulting in dramatic changes in the abundance, distribution and character of surface water features in urban landscapes. However,the scope and consequences of surface water redistribution at broad spatialscales are not well understood. We hypothesized that urbanization would lead to convergent surface water abundance and distribution: in other words, cities will gain or lose water such that they become more similar to each other than are their surrounding natural landscapes. Using a database of more than 1 million water bodies and 1 million km of streams, we compared the surface water of 100 US cities with …

Osmb Final Report: Task 5. Zebra And Quagga Mussel Early-Detection Monitoring In High Risk Oregon Waters, Steve W. Wells, Mark Sytsma

Center for Lakes and Reservoirs Publications and Presentations

Neither zebra nor quagga mussels (Dreissena polymorpha and D. rostriformis bugensis, respectively) were detected by Portland State University (PSU) during their early detection sampling in Oregon water bodies during 2013. PSU conducted sampling for planktonic larvae, juvenile, and adult mussels at nine Oregon water bodies during the July to August period coinciding with water temperatures favorable for mussel spawning. A total of 113 plankton samples were collected and over 1.6 million liters of lake water were filtered through 63-μm mesh nets during plankton sample collection. The greatest sampling effort occurred in East Lake, Prineville Reservoir, and Paulina Lake; these water …

Aquatic Invasive Species Surveys Of Eastern Oregon Waterbodies In 2013 And 2014, Rich Miller, Mark D. Sytsma

Center for Lakes and Reservoirs Publications and Presentations

Early detection aquatic invasive species (AIS) surveys were conducted at 33 Eastern Oregon waterbodies during the summers of 2013 and 2014. Submerged aquatic plants, gastropods, bivalves, and crayfish were collected using a thatch rake, benthic dredge, plankton net, and modified minnow traps. Shoreline aquatic noxious weeds were noted when present and water quality characteristics were measured. Two AIS snail species, one AIS crayfish species, and five AIS plant species were detected during the surveys. Big-ear radix snails (Radix auricularia) were newly detected at 14 waterbodies distributed across the survey area. Chinese mystery snails (Cipangopaludina chinensis) were …

Development Of A Steady-State River Hydrodynamic And Temperature Model Based On Ce-Qual-W2, Wenwei Xu

Dissertations and Theses

CE-QUAL-W2 is a 2-D hydrodynamic and water quality model that has been applied to reservoirs, lakes, river systems, and estuaries throughout the world. However, when this model is applied for shallow systems, this model requires a long calculation time to maintain numerical stability, compared to applications of reservoirs or deeper river systems.

To solve this problem, a new hydrodynamic and temperature model was built based on the framework of CE-QUAL-W2 but that allows for steady-state hydrodynamic computations. By calculating the hydrodynamics at steady-state, the time step for stability is relaxed and simulations can proceed at much higher time steps. The …

A Review Of Urban Water Body Challenges And Approaches: (1) Rehabilitation And Remediation, Robert M. Hughes, Susie Dunham, Kathleen G. Maas-Hebner, J. Alan Yeakley, Carl B. Schreck, Michael Harte, Nancy Molina, Clinton C. Shock, Victor W. Kaczynski, Jeff Schaeffer

Environmental Science and Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

We review how urbanization alters aquatic ecosystems, as well as actions that managers can take to remediate urban waters. Urbanization affects streams by fundamentally altering longitudinal and lateral processes that in turn alter hydrology, habitat, and water chemistry; these effects create physical and chemical stressors that in turn affect the biota. Urban streams often suffer from multiple stressor effects that have collectively been termed an “urban stream syndrome,” in which no single factor dominates degraded conditions. Resource managers have multiple ways of combating the urban stream syndrome. These approaches range from whole-watershed protection to reach-scale habitat rehabilitation, but the prescription …

Towards Improving Drought Forecasts Across Different Spatial And Temporal Scales, Shahrbanou Madadgar

Dissertations and Theses

Recent water scarcities across the southwestern U.S. with severe effects on the living environment inspire the development of new methodologies to achieve reliable drought forecasting in seasonal scale. Reliable forecast of hydrologic variables, in general, is a preliminary requirement for appropriate planning of water resources and developing effective allocation policies. This study aims at developing new techniques with specific probabilistic features to improve the reliability of hydrologic forecasts, particularly the drought forecasts. The drought status in the future is determined by certain hydrologic variables that are basically estimated by the hydrologic models with rather simple to complex structures. Since the …

Osmb Final Report: Task 3. Containment Strategies For Eurasian Watermilfoil Infested Central Or Lakes, Vanessa Morgan, Mark Sytsma

Center for Lakes and Reservoirs Publications and Presentations

In recent years, public awareness of aquatic invasive species (AIS) has increased considerably in Oregon and elsewhere in the western U.S.. News articles, boat inspection stations and AIS permit programs have drawn attention to the threat of aquatic invasive species, especially animals like zebra mussels (Dreissena polymorpha), quagga mussels (Dreissena bugensis), and New Zealand mudsnails (Potamopyrgus antipodarum). However, invasive aquatic plants are also capable of causing severe impacts and may similarly be transferred between waterbodies on boats, trailers or other equipment. Heavy infestations can hinder recreational use by motorized and non-motorized boats, snag fishing lines, threaten the safety of swimmers …

Osmb Final Report: Task 6. Tenmile Lake Boat Wash Effectiveness Monitoring, Samuel Cimino, Angela L. Strecker

Center for Lakes and Reservoirs Publications and Presentations

Public awareness of aquatic invasive species and proper boat cleaning procedures may prove to be beneficial in reducing the transport and establishment of aquatic invasive species like New Zealand mud snails and zebra and quagga mussels as well as hydrilla and Eurasian watermilfoil. The primary objectives of this research project were to observe the use and determine the efficacy of a public boat wash station as well as increase the public’s awareness of proper boat cleaning procedures and aquatic invasive species. The Tenmile Lakes Basin Partnership, Oregon State Marine Board, and the United States Forest Service (USFS) have undertaken an …

Application Of Ce-Qual-W2 On Tigris River In Iraq, Muhanned Al-Murib

Civil and Environmental Engineering Master's Project Reports

The Tigris River is the eastern member of the two great rivers in Iraq. Two big rivers pass through Iraq, Mesopotamia. Tigris and Euphrates Rivers with their tributaries form a major river system in the Middle East. Four riparian countries, Turkey, Syria, Iran, and Iraq, share the Tigris River basin area and Iraq has the majority of this basin area. The total length of the Tigris is 1850 km from which 1418 km is within Iraq. A study area of 880 km from Mosul dam to Kut barrage is modeled using a water quality CE-QUAL-W2 model. CE-QUAL-W2 is a two-dimensional …