Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

All-Weather Surfaces For Cattle Watering Facilities, Stephen F. Higgins, Kylie Schmidt, Donald J. Stamper, Kevin Laurent

Agriculture and Natural Resources Publications

A livestock watering area includes a watering facility and the heavy-use-area (HUA) surrounding it. Without protection, the HUA can develop surface depressions. Surface depressions can render the watering facility inaccessible and no longer frost-proof. Surface depressions also collect rainwater and excrement, creating mud and conditions adverse to livestock health (Figure 1).

Reducing Nutrient Runoff From Poultry Production Facilities Using Locally-Sourced Iron And Aluminum Byproducts, Sheri Lynn Herron

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Phosphorus (P) inputs to fresh waters can accelerate the eutrophication process. Agricultural nutrient runoff has been shown to be a contributor of P and nitrogen (N). Broiler production areas were evaluated for their potential to contribute P and N to runoff. Broiler house dust (BHD) samples were analyzed and compared to broiler litter (BL), rainfall simulations were conducted on plots adjacent to broiler house fans to evaluate nutrient enrichment in runoff from deposited dust, and runoff was automatically sampled at two culverts draining the land around broiler houses. Following this, an on-farm byproduct containment and nutrient removal structure was designed …

Assessment Of Risks And Benefits For Pennsylvania Water Sources When Utilizing Acid Mine Drainage For Hydraulic Fracturing, Frederick R. Davis

Master's Projects and Capstones

The use of Acid Mine Drainage (AMD) in the hydraulic fracturing process increases the complexity of a polarizing topic. Many stakeholders see a potential to provide relief to multiple environmental problems while others see it as another threat to the Pennsylvania water supply so many parties depend on. This research will evaluate data from Pennsylvania state agencies and additional academic research regarding AMD and fracking to assess potential benefits, risks, and complications for Pennsylvania watersheds when using AMD in the fracking process.

Chapter 1 presents background information on energy demand and hydraulic fracturing, as well as energy sources and industrial …

Insect Communities: Ellensburg Upstream Versus Downstream Sites, Michael Balda

Symposium Of University Research and Creative Expression (SOURCE)

Urban stream syndrome occurs when an urban area affects a stream system. Stream burial is common in urban systems, and burial blocks incoming light, potentially affecting available food resources and, in turn, affecting the insect communities. I tested for changes to the stream ecosystem as a result of urbanization by measuring insect community parameters upstream and downstream of buried sites in the three creeks in Ellensburg, Washington, that are affected by urban stream syndrome. I measured chlorophyll on rocks, total suspended sediments (TSS), fine benthic organic matter (FBOM), ammonium, and phosphorus to relate to insect communities characteristics. I hypothesized that …

Exploring Colonial Identity And A Growing Ecoconsciousness On The Great Plains, Charles Hiebner

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

This thesis is an exploration of my journey from an unapologetic industrial agriculturalist to a more environmentally sensitive citizen. I now recognize the inescapable relationship between colonialism and environmental issues surrounding water resources on the Great Plains and how these intertwined issues affect both the planet and its inhabitants. Specifically, I look at literature as both the catalyst and sustainer of my still-growing environmental and social consciousness. From important literary works encountered as a youth to the ecocriticism and explorations of social justice of the readings I engage in today, I examine how these literary choices have led me to …

My Water, My Rights: Ethics And Implications Of Water Privatization, Rachel Vandermyde

Augustana Center for the Study of Ethics Essay Contest

No abstract provided.

Palladium-Catalyzed Ligand-Free And Efficient Suzuki--Miyaura Reaction Of $N$-Methyliminodiacetic Acid Boronates In Water, Chun Liu, Xinmin Li, Xinnan Wang, Jieshan Qiu

Turkish Journal of Chemistry

A green and efficient protocol has been developed for the Pd(OAc)$_{2}$-catalyzed ligand-free Suzuki--Miyaura reaction of $N$-methyliminodiacetic acid (MIDA) boronates in water. In the presence of Pd(OAc)$_{2}$ as a catalyst and ($i$-Pr)$_{2}$NH as a base, the cross-coupling reactions of aryl bromides with aryl MIDA boronates proceeded smoothly in water without any surfactant, and various functional groups were tolerated under the optimized conditions.

San Diego’S Options For Alternate Sources Of Water: A Comparative Analysis Of Water Recycling And Desalination As Alternative Methods To Importing Water, Alana O. Pokorny

Scripps Senior Theses

This paper describes the processes, methods, backgrounds, and economic challenges, of Desalination and Water Recycling and provide current examples of both. To create a baseline with which to compare the two methods, I will also delve into the history of California water policy. This complicated past is the reason water importation into Southern California remains the main method of obtaining water. Yet, as the current drought continues and technology advances, the need for imported water will become obsolete as the methods for recycling and desalinating water become less expensive, more convenient and more equitable. In the conclusion, all the methods …

Stakeholder Perceptions Of Sustainable Value And Water Conservation: A Case Study Of Social, Environmental, And Economic Concerns In The Rookery Bay Estuary, Bruce Victor Lilyea

Department of Conflict Resolution Studies Theses and Dissertations

Stakeholders’ perceptions of social, environmental, and economic concerns in the Rookery Bay Estuary were examined through this research. The purpose of this study was to discover the shared value and common resolution responses for the people of the Rookery Bay area that can extend to other local environmental management scenarios. Using Stakeholder Theory, Rational Choice Theory, Symbolic Interactionism, and Systems Theory as theoretical foundation, the following research questions were considered: RQ1) What are the points of shared value of community stakeholders facing environmental management issues? RQ2) How do the perspectives of the community stakeholders toward the social, environmental, and economic …

Ensuring Our Future Or Sowing The Seeds Of Our Own Destruction? Crop Insurance And Water Use In Texas, Michael Shapiro

Pomona Senior Theses

Agriculture is the largest consumer of water in the United States. Policies that affect agriculture therefore have the potential to have a large effect on the overall use of water. Crop insurance is one such policy, which was found to significantly increase water use in the state of Texas. Much, but not all of this effect can be explained by an increase in planting density, and results vary widely by crop and by region.

Decision Support Tools To Address Climate Change: Climate Model–Land Surface Models, Zea Mays L. (Corn) Phenology And Evapotranspiration–Yield Sensitivity Models For Nebraska, Usa, Jane A. Okalebo

School of Natural Resources: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Nebraska's climate is highly variable and is expected to change in the future with anthropogenic global warming (AGW), resulting in warmer spring and summer temperatures coupled with more erratic rainfall events. This has strong implications for agriculture in the region, yet it is not clear that current modeling and decision-support tools are adequate to address these looming changes and provide planning, mitigation and adaptation strategies. To address climate change and its implications to agriculture in Nebraska, a set of robust decision support tools are very crucial. This study herein are divided into three chapters, with each chapter addressing a specific …

Catechol Oxidation By Ozone And Hydroxyl Radicals At The Air-Water Interface, Elizabeth A. Pillar, Robert C. Camm, Marcelo I. Guzman

Chemistry Faculty Publications

Anthropogenic emissions of aromatic hydrocarbons promptly react with hydroxyl radicals undergoing oxidation to form phenols and polyphenols (e.g., catechol) typically identified in the complex mixture of humic-like substances (HULIS). Because further processing of polyphenols in secondary organic aerosols (SOA) can continue mediated by a mechanism of ozonolysis at interfaces, a better understanding about how these reactions proceed at the air–water interface is needed. This work shows how catechol, a molecular probe of the oxygenated aromatic hydrocarbons present in SOA, can contribute interfacial reactive species that enhance the production of HULIS under atmospheric conditions. Reactive semiquinone radicals are quickly produced upon …

Vernal Pool: A Participatory Art Project About Place + Precipitation, Karen Miranda Abel, Jessica Marion Barr

The Goose

Produced by Karen Miranda Abel with Jessica Marion Barr, Vernal Pool is an immersive, elemental water installation created as a participatory, contemplative inquiry into our transitory interrelationships with water and landscape. From November 2013 to April 2014, 114 individuals across Canada and abroad gathered snow samples as a form of extrinsic artistic practice about place and precipitation. With the arrival of spring, the reservoir of melted snow was convened for four days at Toronto’s historic Gladstone Hotel to create Vernal Pool.

Irrigation Tips To Conserve Water And Grow A Healthy Lawn, Gregg Munshaw, Brad Lee

Agriculture and Natural Resources Publications

Turfgrasses are composed of thousands of cells, all containing water, in which metabolic processes such as photosynthesis and respiration take place. Water makes up 80 to 90 percent of the total plant mass. If this level drops below 60 percent, these processes may slow and wilting will occur. Water is critically important for:

• Maintaining turgidity, which keeps plants standing upright
• Transporting nutrients and sugars through the plant
• Chemical reactions
• Transpirational cooling when water moves out of the leaves and evaporates

Long-Term Protection Of Freshwater Resources Following Co2 Storage, University Of North Dakota. Energy And Environmental Research Center

EERC Brochures and Fact Sheets

Fact sheet about mechanisms used to protect freshwater resources following CO₂ injection. Outlines U.S. Department of Energy’s research on water safety. [This item is an outdated or superseded version and retained for historical purposes only. It may no longer reflect current information, policies, or practices.]

The Barriers To Adopting Composting Toilets Into Use In Urban And Suburban Locations In The United States, Julia Branstrator

Open Access Theses

The amount of fresh water available in the world is a finite resource. Large quantities of the fresh water are located in remote locations, while more accessible sources of fresh water are disproportionately distributed around the world. Some populations lack reliable access to clean water for daily life, making the routine use of potable water in toilets of upper-income countries a questionable practice in terms of resource responsibility, energy use, and sustainable infrastructure. The innovative nature of composting toilets offers potential solutions to the downfalls of conventional, waterborne toilets. However, the path to adoption of composting toilets has encountered barriers …

Experiments On Tracer Diffusion In Aqueous And Non-Aqueous Solvent Combinations, Duncan M. Frasch, Daniel Spiegel

Physics and Astronomy Faculty Research

Forced Rayleigh scattering is used to study the tracer diffusion of an azobenzene in binary combinations of polar solvents, including water. In the absence of water, the tracer diffusion coefficient D in the mixture lies between the diffusion coefficients within the pure solvents, on a curve that is reasonably close to the prediction of free-volume theory. If water is present, on the other hand, the diffusion coefficient displays a minimum that is less than the smaller of the two pure-solvent values. We attempt to understand the different behavior in water by concentrating on the fairly hydrophobic nature of the solute, …

Polyol Induced Extraction (Pie) Of Water From Organic Solvents, Mithilesh Deshpande

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Acetonitrile (ACN) is used in huge quantities for Reversed Phase High Performance Liquid Chromatography (RP-HPLC) experiments. For most of the part, these results in waste that is only contaminated with large amounts of water, buffer and trace organic impurities. It would seem worthwhile to purify the ACN from water using a mass separating agent (MSA). In a quest for an MSA, our investigation reveals polyols as a new class of MSAs. It is observed that when a polyol such as glycerol, sorbitol, erythritol, xylitol, Isomalt® or maltitol is added to a mixture of ACN-water, the ACN separates out of the …

Volunteered Geographic Information For Water Management: A Prototype Architecture, Maria Antonia Brovelli, Luca Dotti, Marco Minghini, Massimo Pancaldi, Giorgio Zamboni

International Conference on Hydroinformatics

Driven by Web 2.0 technology and the almost ubiquitous presence of mobile devices, Volunteered Geographic Information (VGI) is knowing an unprecedented growth. These notable technological advancements have opened fruitful perspectives also in the field of water management and protection, raising the demand for a reconsideration of policies which also takes into account the emerging trend of VGI. This research investigates the opportunity of leveraging such technology to involve citizens equipped with common mobile devices (e.g. tablets and smartphones) in a campaign of report of water-related phenomena. The work is carried out in collaboration with ADBPO - Autorità di bacino del …

Development And Applications Of The Expanded Equivalent Fluid Method, Bharath Kumar Kandula

Dissertations

Ocean acoustics is the study of sound in the oceans. Electromagnetic waves attenuate rapidly in the water medium. Sound is the best means to transmit information underwater. Computational numerical simulations play an important role in ocean acoustics. Simulations of acoustic propagation in the oceans are challenging due to the complexities involved in the ocean environment. Different methods have been developed to simulate underwater sound propagation. The Parabolic-Equation (PE) method is the best choice in several ocean acoustic problems. In shallow water acoustic experiments, sound loses some of its energy when it interacts with the bottom. An equivalent fluid technique was …

Development Of A Public Education Website: Building Bridges Over Water, Angelina Mckee

Agricultural Education and Communication

Website created by Angelina McKee to educate the public about water resource issues. Water is the basic unit of life, water resources are the basis for what societies and ecosystems are founded upon. Water shortages and droughts are more prevalent in our ever-changing world. It is no shock that there are discrepancies between various stockholders on either sides of the dry riverbed. This senior project resulted in the development of a website that addresses global water resources, water use in California, water conservation, and water allocation. The website informs the public on water resources and related issues and will hopefully …

Liming Kentucky Lawns, Gregg Munshaw, Edwin L. Ritchey

Agriculture and Natural Resources Publications

Most homeowners desire an aesthetically pleasing landscape and will take steps to ensure success. Proper fertilizing, watering, and pest control are all steps that will lead to a quality lawn. However, some confusion surrounds when and why lime should be applied to a lawn. Many homeowners believe that lime needs to be applied on an annual basis for a quality lawn. The purpose of this publication is to explain why lime is needed and whether it is required on your lawn.

How Dry Seasons Affect Woody Plants, Nicole Ward Gauthier, Susan Fox, Kathy Wimberley

Agriculture and Natural Resources Publications

Pattern, frequency, and amounts of rainfall are important components to plant health. Water is an essential plant component, making up 70 percent to 90 percent of plant mass. Growth, photosynthesis (manufacture of food), nutrient transport, important chemical reactions, and the production of secondary metabolites are all dependent upon water uptake from roots. Water expands and enlarges new cells within stems and leaves, which holds them upright (turgor pressure).

During dry seasons and drought conditions, plants become stressed (Figure 1). Growth ceases, nutrient transport slows, and plants wilt as cells become water-deficient. Severe, long-term, or consecutive drought events may cause permanent …

2014 Martz Summer Conference Poster Session, University Of Colorado Boulder. Getches-Wilkinson Center For Natural Resources, Energy, And The Environment, University Of Colorado Boulder. Airwatergas Sustainability Research Network

Water and Air Quality Issues in Oil and Gas Development: The Evolving Framework of Regulation and Management (Martz Summer Conference, June 5-6)

1 page.

This Conference is presented by the Getches-Wilkinson Center for Natural Resources, Energy, and the Environment, in conjunction with the Air-Water-Gas Sustainability Research Network. Technological advances for extracting oil and gas from shale deposits have ushered in a new era of energy development in key resource-rich pockets throughout the US. In this event, we review the ongoing efforts of governments and industry to develop the regulatory and management practices necessary to protect water and air resources, drawing on the latest scientific research to tackle areas of uncertainty and to inform future action.

Water In The 21st Century, Grayson Michael Shor

Social Sciences

The aim of this research project is to provide a comprehensive and global analysis of water use in order to provide the reader with a comprehensive grasp of current and impending issues. The included five (5) chapters discuss water distribution, conservation, purification, law, international development, economic debates, ethical consideration, as well as educated estimations of the effects water related issues may cause in the next one-hundred years.

Green Infrastructure: A New Way Of Addressing Water Quality Issues Within A Growing Population., Marlin Martes

2014 Student Theses

Abstract

Beneath the great metropolis known as New York City, underlies an intricate system of water networks linking all of New York City’s five boroughs. In the same manner that veins function as vessels for the transportation of blood in the circulatory system, NYC’s water system interconnects all of the diverse communities found at multiple levels of society within the city. Regardless of origin or background, today all NYC residents and visitors share NYC’s tap water as a natural resource without fearing water scarcity tomorrow. However, as the estimated population in New York City is expected to rise above 9 …

Water Water Everywhere: Analyzing Long Island's Water Issues And Finding Solutions For A Sustainable Future, Anthony T. Becker

2014 Student Theses

Over three million people call Long Island their home. With access to beautiful landscapes, world-renowned beaches, and proximity to New York City, it is no wonder that so many proudly call this geographic stretch of glacial till their home. However, throughout the years our actions do not necessarily reflect this affection we have to our home. Years of sprawl and human infestation across the island have resulted in widespread environmental degradation. Specifically, the water we drink and the beaches we enjoy have become endangered. I plan on studying the urban ecology of how intensified population growth led to the eutrophication …

Monitoring, Verification, And Accounting Plans Of Water Resources During The Geologic Storage Of Carbon Dioxide, University Of North Dakota. Energy And Environmental Research Center

EERC Brochures and Fact Sheets

Fact sheet examines the CO₂ monitoring, verification, and accounting (MVA) framework. Highlights measures taken to protect water resources. Developed by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Water Working Group. [This item is an outdated or superseded version and retained for historical purposes only. It may no longer reflect current information, policies, or practices.]

Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership Water Working Group, University Of North Dakota. Energy And Environmental Research Center

EERC Brochures and Fact Sheets

Fact sheet about the U.S. Department of Energy Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership’s Water Working Group. Includes information on the role of water in carbon capture and storage (CCS), and addressing stakeholder concerns regarding technological development. [This item is an outdated or superseded version and retained for historical purposes only. It may no longer reflect current information, policies, or practices.]

Calculating Groundwater Recharge: The Navajo Sandstone Of Southern Utah, Matthew Olson, Dr. Greg Carling

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Southern Utah is world renowned for its beautiful canyons and red rock features. The Navajo Sandstone, an Early Jurassic formation created by 2000 feet of petrified sand dunes, is one of the primary features of this unique landscape. Groundwater in the Navajo Sandstone is important for sustaining life in arid southern Utah communities and ensuring recreational usability for state and national parks. Springs that discharge from the Navajo Sandstone aquifer in Zion National Park are a primary source of water to the Virgin River, which provides water for a number of towns in arid southern Utah (Christensen et al., 2005). …