Environmental Engineering Commons^™

Bayesian Estimation Of Source Term Of Atmospheric Radiation Release With Interval Prior, O. Tichý, V. Šmídl, R. Hofman

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Detection of release of an atmospheric pollutant is a problem of interest in environmental sciences. We are concerned with estimation of unknown source term of the release. Formally, the problem is formulated as a linear model where measurements are explained using source-receptor- sensitivity matrix obtained from atmospheric transport model and source term vector which has to be estimated. Specifically, we estimate the release of radioactivity from measurements of gamma dose rate (GDR). The problem of isolation of activity of individual nuclides is poorly conditioned. We propose a probabilistic model with the prior information on intervals of nuclide ratios. The model …

A Simulation Platform To Assess Forest Landscape Resilience, Werner Rammer, Rupert Seidl

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Forest ecosystems suffer increasingly from pressures such as anthropogenic climatic change, while at the same time being subject to an increasing societal demand for ecosystem services. In addition to direct climate effects on tree growth and regeneration recent research suggests that climate-induced changes in disturbance regimes will likely increase the volatility of future forest trajectories. Addressing these challenges requires a coupled human and natural systems perspective, as most of Europe’s forests are heavily influenced by management, and forests are a crucial component in the emerging bioeconomy. Methodologically, assessments of the long-term socio-ecological resilience of forest ecosystems require approaches that combine …

Advanced Clustering To Integrate Spatial Socio-Ecological Components In Decision-Making: A Case Study On Sustainable Agriculture, Stéphane Bourrelly, Antonino Marvuglia, Ian Vázquez-Rowe

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Accounting for the direct and indirect role of ecosystem services (ES) in supporting human activities is a priority among governmental targets to develop strategies of impact mitigation with the mutual effect of increasing human well-being. Although a great deal of research is currently being done on ES assessment, the volume of available data and the complexity of mechanisms make the decision-making process difficult. We highlight the strengths of unsupervised clustering for handling geographic multidimensional datasets. We explain why the outputs, both in qualitative and quantitative form, can help stakeholders to conceive sustainable policies. At the same time, we point out …

Fuzzy Vs Neural Network Models For Environmental Decision Support System Implementation Aiming To Standardise The Multiparametric Decision In A Drinking Water Plant With Electrodialysis Reversal, Montse Dalmau, Hèctor Monclús, Joan Espasa, Natasa Atanasova, Manel Poch, Pere Emiliano, Oriol Capdevila, Santiago González, Fernando Valero

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The development of an environmental decision support system (EDSS) by means of two different aims to support the operators’ decisions in the drinking water treatment plant (DWTP), equipped with the biggest electrodialysis reversal (EDR) in the world has been tested. A fuzzy artificial neural network model (fuzzy) and an artificial neural network (ANN) have been compared for optimizing the decision: how to manage water blending ratios from EDR and conventional treatment of the drinking water plant, evaluating Llobregat River characteristics (inlet DWTP), current operating conditions of DWTP, weather conditions and distribution requirements on-line. This tool has been tested among 4,5 …

Modelling Small Agricultural Dams Dynamics Into The Maelia Multi-Agent Platform, Romain Lardy, Camille Truche, Olivier Therond

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

In France, during the three last decades farmers built numerous small dams to have alternative resources for irrigation. In water deficit situations, one major question of the debate is the cumulative effect at watershed and river basin levels of small water dams on stream flows during the low flow period. This paper presents a new modelling framework to simulate hydrology and cumulative effect of small agricultural dams at river basin level that was implemented in the multi-agent modelling and simulation MAELIA platform. This modelling framework is based on the distinction of four types of small dams: connected to groundwater; disconnected …

A Multi-Disciplinary Procedure To Ascertain Biofilm Formation In Drinking Water Pipes, Eva Ramos-Martinez, Manuel Herrera, Joaquín Izquierdo, Rafael Pérez-García

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Biofilm development in drinking water distribution systems (DWDSs) is a real problem negatively affecting service and water quality, and, thus, the satisfaction of the final consumers. It is the direct and indirect responsible for many of the DWDSs’ problems, and a lot of resources are invested to mitigate its effects. Addressing this problem has been a concern of researchers and DWDS managers for years. However, it is only recently that both technology and data have been available to support the new approach presented in this work. Our proposal is based on the combination of various existing data sets from similar …

Modelling Lifestyle And Energy Footprint In Europe’S “Oil Capital” Using An Agent-Based Model, Jiagi Ge, Gary Polhill, Tony Craig, Nan Liu, Deborah Roberts

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The economy of Aberdeen, UK is heavily concentrated in the North Sea oil and gas industry. Until recently, it had enjoyed steady economic growth and low unemployment rate. However, since the oil price plummeted in the end of 2014, the local economy has been through tremendous turmoil. This paper develops an agent-based model of the economic, social and urban systems of Aberdeen to study the impact of economic conditions on residential mobility and urban energy footprint. We develop a dynamic and spatially-explicit agent-based model that covers four important aspects of life: economy and employment, housing, transport and social infrastructure. Through …

The Framework And Application Of Vulnerability Assessment Of Reclaimed Land To Typhoon Storm Surge Inundation, Shuyun Dong, Wayne J. Stephenson, Sarah Wakes, Zhongyuan Chen, Jianzhong Ge

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The coastal area has naturally attractive to population and industry due to its convenient geographical location and abundant resources. While the coastal area provides geographical advantages and resources for urban development, it also experiencing a dramatically growing vulnerability to natural hazards. For coastal mega-cities like Shanghai, typhoon storm surge presents a significant threat to both infrastructure and populations with relatively high vulnerability. Another fact about Shanghai coastal area is that the reclamation land has grown substantially due to the huge demand of land for further urban development. On the one hand, the reclamation land can alleviate the continuous growth of …

Simulating Spatial Changes In Vegetation-Livestock Interactions Under Different Landscape Structures: A Multi-Agent System Applied To Agro-Pastoral Territories, Mamadou Sané, Jonathan Vayssières, Myriam Grillot, Alassane Bah, Alexandre Ickowicz

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Free-range and common-grazing ruminants play a major role in the functioning and the provision of ecosystem services by agro- and silvo-pastoral ecosystems in sub-Saharan Africa. To assess how landscape structure affects the nature of environment-herd-services interactions, this paper describes a Multi-Agent System (MAS) that simulates daily herd movements in a dynamic environment. The model is used to study how the overall productivity of an agricultural territory is affected by the spatial organization of its different landscape units. The originality of this model lies in fine representation, in hourly time steps, of a herd’s movements and activities over the seasons depending …

Comparison Of The Offline And The Online Bias Correction Of The Wrf-Eurad In Porto, Portugal, K. I. Hoi, K. V. Yuen, K. M. Mok, A. I. Miranda, I. Ribeiro

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

This study compared two types of (offline vs. online) bias correction models applied to correct the mismatch between the predicted daily averaged PM₁₀ concentration by the deterministic air quality forecasting system WRF-EURAD and the measured concentration at the air quality monitoring station in Porto, Portugal. The WRF-EURAD is a Eulerian system consisting of a Weather Research Forecasting (WRF) model and a European Air Pollution Dispersion (EURAD) model. Both bias correction models were linear statistical models developed with the same set of input variables. The major difference between the online or the offline models is the adaptiveness. While the coefficients …

Actor-Based System Dynamics Modelling Of Win-Win Climate Mitigation Options, Dmitry V. Kovalevsky, Klaus Hasselmann

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The actor-based system dynamics approach to Integrated Assessment modelling (IAM), seen as further development of ‘traditional’ system dynamics economic modelling, however with a stronger emphasis on describing the decision making of key aggregate economics actors, is a promising methodology for developing the comprehensive IAMs of next generations. The present paper is focused on application of actor-based system dynamics models to identification and assessment of win-win opportunities of climate mitigation policies. Modelling results outlined suggest that in a multi-country world properly designed climate mitigation policies can unite rather than divide different nations, therefore putting under question the ‘juggernaut’ of much discussed …

Targeting Rebates In The Water-Energy Nexus, Alvar Escriva-Bou, Manuel Pulido-Velazquez, Jay R. Lund

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Water conservation is often the most cost effective source of additional water supply for water stressed regions to maintain supply reliability with increasing population and/or demands, or shorter-term droughts. In previous research we demonstrated how including energy savings of conserved water can increase willingness to adopt conservation measures, at the same time that increases energy and GHG emissions savings. But the capacity to save water, energy and GHG emissions depends fundamentally in the economic benefits for customers and utilities.

Utilities have traditionally used rebates, subsidies or incentives to enhance water conservation. But the economic benefits originated by these rebates depend …

A New Gpr Image Analysis Proposal Based On A Multi-Agent Approach And Properties Of Groups – Towards Automatic Interpretations, David Ayala-Cabreraa, Manuel Herrera, Joaquin Izquierdo, Rafael Pérez-García, Olivier Piller

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

This paper proposes a new methodology to analyze images from subsoil surveys obtained by using ground penetrating radar (GPR) as a non-destructive method. The aim is to advance towards automatic GPR image interpretations. The main idea is to promote the inclusion of these non- destructive technologies as support in technical management in large-scale systems such as water distribution systems (WDSs). The methodology proposed in this paper uses pre-processing techniques based on a multi-agent approach and analysis of the properties of the obtained groups. In addition, a first classification (via perceptron) of the selected property in the groups is performed. The …

Development And Evaluation Of A Parsimonious Agro-Hydrological Model To Assess Agricultural Managements Strategies For Climate Change Adaptation, H. Van Gaelen, E. Vanuytrecht, P. Willems, J. Diels, D. Raes

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

While simple crop and hydrological models are limited with respect to the number and accuracy of the processes they incorporate, complex models have high demand for data. Due to these limitations, there is a need for new agro-hydrological models that can simulate the impact of agronomic and environmental changes on both crop productivity and water availability in agricultural catchments, without vast data requirements for model input and calibration. AquaCrop-Hydro was developed to fill the need for a such a parsimonious, physically sound and widely applicable agro- hydrological model. The model was developed by linking the process-based AquaCrop crop water productivity …

Spatial Evolution Of Urban Fabrics Extracted From Spatiotemporal Topographic Database Using Symbolic Dynamic Time Warping, Pierre Gançarski, Anne Puissant, François Petitjean

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

This article introduces a new methodology dedicated to extracting the evolution of urban blocks from spatiotemporal topographic databases where an urban block is defined as the smallest area that is surrounded by communication network. To achieve this analysis, we apply the ascendant hierarchical clustering to sequences of urban block states (i.e.; sequences of class labels to which the block belongs to on each date). The principal originality of this approach is to use a measure based on DTW (Dynamic Time Warping) which is able to apprehend temporal behaviours (mainly time lags in dates corresponding to a change of state) and …

A Simple Integrated Assessment Approach To Global Change Simulation And Evaluation, K. B. Z. Ogutu, F. D’Andrea, M. Ghil

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

We further develop and study a Coupled Climate-Economy-Biosphere (CoCEB) model. This simple and highly idealized model constitutes the basis of our integrated assessment approach to simulating and evaluating global change. CoCEB is composed of a physical climate module, based on Earth’s energy balance, and an economy module that uses endogenous economic growth with physical and human capital accumulation. A biosphere model is likewise under study and will be coupled to the existing two modules. We concentrate on the interactions between the two subsystems: the effect of climate on the economy, via damage functions, and the effect of the economy on …

Creating Best Bathymetry Using The Iqmulus High Volume Fusion And Analysis Platform For Geospatial Point Clouds, Quillon Harpham, Jennifer Herbert, Vibeke Skytt

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

New data acquisition techniques are emerging and are providing a fast and efficient means for multidimensional spatial data collection. Single and multi-beam echo-sounders, airborne LIDAR, SAR satellites and mobile mapping systems are increasingly used for the digital reconstruction of the environment. All these systems provide point clouds, often enriched with other sensor data providing extremely high volumes of raw data. With these acquisition approaches, a great deal of data is collected, but it often requires harmonisation and integration before reaching its maximum use potential. For use in modelling waves and flow in seas and oceans, collections of surveys of water …

Smart Meter Enabled Dynamic Pricing Of Water, Charles Rougé, Julien Harou, Paola Garrone, Manuel Pulido-Velazquez, Riccardo Marzano, Matteo Giuliani, Andrea Cominola, Antonio Lopez-Nicolas, Andrea Castelleti, Andrea-Emilio Rizzoli

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The advent of smart metering is set to revolutionize many aspects of the relationship between water utilities and their customers. Smart-metered data supports enhanced customer interaction, enables linking to social media and paves the way for dynamic tariffs (prices that change over time). For dynamic pricing, metering must have sufficiently high frequency and enable billing users individually; smart metering enables this. Dynamic tariffs aim to either reduce demand or shift it in time and can be designed for revenue neutrality with the wider aim of increasing economic, social or environmental benefits. Two dynamic water pricing schemes are described here: scarcity …

Rural Livelihood, Biodiversity And Carbon Stock In Vietnam Mountains: Agent-Based Modeling To Anticipate Trade-Offs, Quang Bao Le

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Assessment of future multiple ecosystem services driven by alternative land-use policies is useful for supporting decisions about what and where to invest for the best overall environmental and developmental outcomes. The task faces a great challenge due to the inherent complexity of human- landscape systems and trade-offs between rural livelihood improvement, biodiversity conservation and carbon sequestration. Agent-based system models have been recognized to be well suited to simulate the co-evolutions of the community and landscape systems in response to policy interventions. The study applies the Land Use Dynamics Simulator (LUDAS) framework to a mountain watershed in central Vietnam for anticipating …

Improving Evapotranspiration Simulation In Swat Using Remote Sensing, A. Teklesadik, A. Van Griensven, Tadesse Alemayehu, W. G.M. Bastiaanssen

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Evapotranspiration (ET) is the main hydrological component besides precipitation, but evapotranspiration calculations in hydrological models are poorly validated. In our study, we used an ensemble of monthly ET estimations derived from remote sensing (RS) obtained from ALEXI, MODIS ,CMRSET and SSEBOP RS models, as a reference for evaluating ET simulation results from SWAT in the Upper Blue Nile Basin (UBN). A comparison indicates that SWAT ET estimation is lower than the ensemble mean RS-ET estimations during dry season, where as for the wet season simulated SWAT ET is comparable with RS ET. These results indicate an underestimation of vegetation transpiration …

Quantile Regression Ensemble For Summer Temperatures Time Series And Its Impact On Built Environment Studies, Manuel Herrera, Matthew Eames, Alfonso Ramallo-Gonzalez, Chunde Liu, David Coley

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The occurrence of heat waves, heavy rainfall, or drought periods have an increasing trend nowadays as consequence of Earths global warming. This seriously affects natural habitats and directly impacts on the human environment. Architects and engineers use different approaches to model reference and future weather conditions to achieve building designs that resilient and energy efficient. However, modelling extreme weather events within those future conditions is a relative few explored field. This paper introduces the analysis of regression models for summer temperature time series that facilitate the representation of those extreme events; this is based on upper and lower quantiles, instead …

Multi-Dimensional Hydraulic Coupling For Flood Forecasting, S. Barthélémy, S. Ricci, N. Goutal, T. Morel, E. Le Pape

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

In the context of hydrodynamic modelling the use of 2D models is of fundamental importance in areas where the flow is not mono-dimensional. Nonetheless, the lack of bathymetric data to develop a global 2D model over an entire network or the computational cost of a global 2D model can be prohibitive for operational flood forecasting services. To overcome this limitation a solution is to use multi-dimensional coupling with the use of 1D models where the flow is mono- dimensional and the use of 2D models when needed. Multi-dimensional coupling allows for the use of a global hydrodynamic 1D/2D model over …

Using Bayesian Networks To Evaluate The Vulnerability Of Smallholder Farmers In Increasingly Globalized Markets, Victoria Junquera, Adrienne Grêt-Regamey

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Agricultural systems in northern Laos are undergoing a rapid transformation from subsistence-based to increasingly export-oriented production of cash crops such as rubber, banana, and sugarcane, with important consequences for local livelihoods and ecosystem services. Our work aims first to identify the drivers of these land use and land cover (LULC) changes, and in turn to understand the impact of such changes on livelihood vulnerability. We define the vulnerability of the local system (in this case the village) in terms of its exposure and sensitivity to stress, as well as its resilience, i.e., its capacity to cope with the stress, either …

Land Use Change Effects Of Oil Palm Expansion On Ecosystem Services In Tapi River Basin, Thailand, Kanokwan Saswattecha, Lars Hein, Carolien Kroeze, Warit Jawjit

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The last decades have shown a strong increase in oil palm production in Thailand. This is increasingly leading to land conversion including loss of forest habitat. However the specific direct and indirect land use effects of oil palm expansion in Thailand are as yet insufficiently understood. We selected the Tapi river Basin and model land use change caused by oil palm expansion. We analysed both direct and indirect land use change effects, using spatial analysis in ArcGIS 10.0 in combination with farmer interviews. Our analysis shows that in the first decade after 2000, direct-land-use-change (dLUC) amounted to 102,000 ha, and …

Systems Approach To Link Big Socio-Ecological Geo-Data To Food Systems Sustainability, Quang Bao Le, Chandrashekhar Biradar, Enrico Bonaiuti, Richard Thomas

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Rapid development of multi-dimensionally, multi-scale, timely updated socio-ecological geo-data presents an opportunity as potential information resource for supporting effective decision- making of stakeholders involved with food systems, from daily routines of individuals to strategic decisions of manager and policy-makers. However, the use of this type of big data toward supporting the sustainability of food systems at different scales still fall short of (i) what information commonly needed by food system actors to response and adapt to socio-ecological change and enhance the system performance, (ii) interoperability between different types of data across scales, and (iii) sufficient guidance to utilize big data …

Challenges And Opportunities For Urban Decarbonization At The Global Scale, Roger Cremades

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Urban areas emit roughly three quarters of global carbon emissions. Cities are crucial elements for a decarbonized society, however, there is not a framework to analyse cities at the global scale. Supervised machine learning from remote sensing provides information about human settlements from 4 dates (1974, 1990, 2000 and 2014), allowing the creation of the Global Human Settlement Layer (GHSL) which jointly with the Gridded Population of the World (GPW) provides the basis for this study. This dynamic evolution of 250 metre sided cells and its population at the global scale gives an unprecedented opportunity to analyse a backbone of …

Profiling Residential Water Users’ Routines By Eigenbehavior Modelling, A. Cominola, A. Moro, L. Riva, M. Giuliani, A. Castelleti

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Developing effective demand-side management strategies is essential to meet future residential water demands, pursue water conservation, and reduce the costs for water utilities. The effectiveness of water demand management strategies relies on our understanding of water consumers’ behavior and their consumption habits and routines, which can be monitored through the deployment of smart metering technologies and the adoption of data analytics and machine learning techniques. This work contributes a novel modeling procedure, based on a combination of clustering and principal component analysis, which allows performing water users’ segmentation on the basis of their eigenbehaviors (i.e., recurrent water consumption behaviors) automatically …

Evapotranspiration Mapping Using Sebal Algorithms To Account For Agricultural Water Uses In The Upper Pangani, Tanzania, Anna Msigwa, Ann Van Griensven, Hans C. Komakech, Boud Verbeiren, Tim Hessels, Wim G. M. Bastiaanssen

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

To make informed decisions, river basin managers requires information on demands and actual usage from different sectors in the basin. Such water use information has to be adequate in terms of quantities used per sector, where and when. However, because of high costs of maintaining equipment for monitoring use, it is very difficult to obtain this information in developing arid and semi- arid areas of Sub-Saharan Africa. The use of proxy method such as calculation of evapotranspiration is proposed as a cheaper means for such data acquisition. Water consumption through crop evapotranspiration (ET) is a major component of water withdrawal, …

Data-Driven Rainfall/Runoff Modelling Based On A Neuro-Fuzzy Inferential System, N. Bartoletti, F. Casagli, S. Marsili-Libelli, A. Nardi, A. Oliva, L. Palandri

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The development of rainfall/runoff models may involve extensive computation and differing platforms, including GIS. In this paper we present a simple data-driven approach which avoids the use of GIS, but is based on a combination of Principal Component Analysis (PCA) and an Adaptive Neuro Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS) to produce a simple and effective output flow prediction based on previous rainfall/runoff data. Given the ANFIS internal complexity, the emphasis of the paper is on how to set-up the most representative and parsimonious data structure that produces an efficient output flow estimation. In the preliminary data reduction stage, the PCA approach …

A Bayesian Method For Data Assimilation In Probabilistic Wave Forecasting, Quillon Harpham, Nigel Tozer, Paul Cleverley, David Wyncoll, Doug Cresswell

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

New innovations are emerging which offer opportunities to reduce the uncertainty of forecasts of wave conditions. These include probabilistic modelling results, such as those based on an ensemble of multiple predictions which can provide a measure of the uncertainty, and new sources of observational data such as GNSS reflectometry and FerryBoxes, which can be combined with an increased availability of more traditional static sensors. This paper outlines an application of the Bayesian statistical methodology which combines these innovations. The method modifies the probabilities of ensemble wave forecasts based on recent past performance of individual members against a set of observations …