Journal of Hydro-environment Research最新文献

This study aims to analyze the environmental and economic impacts of land use change and water abstraction in the Zarrineh River basin, which is Lake Urmia’s main inflow source in the north-west of Iran. The Soil & Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) is used to model water quantity and quality in the basin. Environmental Kuznets Curves (EKC) are used to assess the relationship between environmental degradation and the development of the agricultural sector. Two scenarios were employed to identify the effects of dam construction and land use change on stream flow, evapotranspiration, groundwater recharge and nitrate loads in the area. The SWAT model showed a satisfactory to very good performance for monthly stream flow at most of the gauges in calibration and validation periods as well as a reasonable performance for nitrate loads. The estimated EKC indicates that the environmental degradation in the inverted U-shape that has passed its peak and the rate of degradation has decreased. Based on the scenarios, the dam has a strong impact on nitrate loads in the basin and water inflow into Lake Urmia. Results verify that human influences have had negative impacts on the Zarrineh River basin. In particular, the extensive development of the agricultural sector has not only drastically reduced the inflow of water to Lake Urmia accelerating the drying up of the lake, but it has also increased nitrate loads. Therefore, it can be recommended to take counter measures within the catchment area to improve the ecological status of Lake Urmia.

Scroll vortex intakes are hydraulic structures commonly used in water supply, drainage and sewerage systems. Water flows into the intake via an eccentric approach channel and a vortex chamber imparts swirl to the flow, leading to a stable air core vortex along the dropshaft. Although much effort has been devoted to investigate the scroll vortex flow, yet the understanding on its hydraulic characteristics is still far from complete due to a lack of detailed velocity field measurements. This paper presents the first comprehensive measurement of the three-dimensional (3D) flow field of a scroll vortex intake using non-intrusive Laser Doppler Anemometry (LDA). A validated 3D Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) model with the Volume-Of-Fluid (VOF) method is developed for interpreting the measurement. It is found that the vortex flow in the scroll chamber resembles a free vortex and the circulation is approximately equal to that at the chamber inlet, with a thin bottom boundary layer. The vortex flow at the bellmouth outlet possesses a circulation constant smaller than that in the chamber, and its vertical velocity component is approximately constant across the flow thickness.

Many bridges that lie within possible tsunami inundation zones are critical links in transport networks. Some efforts have been made to determine the effects of tsunamis on bridges, but only a limited range of published design guidelines are available. Therefore, it is necessary to further investigate the effects of tsunamis on bridges. In the current study, physical modeling experiments were carried out to measure bore impact forces and pressures for various tsunami bore strengths on a bridge deck with different abutment types (wing wall and spill-through) and different opening and submergence ratios. The experiments were conducted in a wave flume with dimensions of 14 × 1.2 × 0.8 m (length × width × height), equipped with an automatic gate designed to generate a tsunami bore. The horizontal and vertical forces showed an increasing trend with increasing submergence ratio for both types of abutment. However, the horizontal force showed a decreasing trend as the opening ratio decreased, while the vertical force initially increased as the opening ratio decreased, until it reached a peak value, and then it started to decrease. The overall shapes of the results for both types of abutment are similar, with higher values for spill-through abutments due to their lower energy dissipation rates. Based on the experimental data, empirical equations are proposed for estimation of tsunami loads as a function of opening and submergence ratios.

Accurate streamflow (Q_t) prediction can provide critical information for urban hydrological management strategies such as flood mitigation, long-term water resources management, land use planning and agricultural and irrigation operations. Since the mid-20th century, Artificial Intelligence (AI) models have been used in a wide range of engineering and scientific fields, and their application has increased in the last few years. In this study, the predictive capabilities of the reduced error pruning tree (REPT) model, used both as a standalone model and within five ensemble-approaches, were evaluated to predict streamflow in the Kurkursar basin in Iran. The ensemble-approaches combined the REPT model with the bootstrap aggregation (BA), random committee (RC), random subspace (RS), additive regression (AR) and disjoint aggregating (DA) (i.e. BA-REPT, RC-REPT, RS-REPT, AR-REPT and DA-REPT). The models were developed using 15 years of daily rainfall and streamflow data for the period 23 September 1997 to 22 September 2012. A set of eight different input scenarios was constructed using different combinations of the input variables to find the most effective scenario based on the linear correlation coefficient. A comprehensive suite of graphical (time-variation graph, scatter-plot, violin plot and Taylor diagram) and quantitative metrics (root mean square error (RMSE), mean absolute error (MAE), Nash-Sutcliff efficiency (NSE), Percent of BIAS (PBIAS) and the ratio of RMSE to the standard deviation of observation (RSR)) was applied to evaluate the prediction accuracy of the six models developed. The outcomes indicated that all models performed well but the AR-REPT outperformed all the other models by rendering lower errors and higher precision across a number of statistical measures. The use of the BA, RC, RS, AR and DA models enhanced the performance of the standalone REPT model by about 26.82%, 18.91%, 7.69%, 28.99% and 28.05% respectively.

Seepage well is an emerging Low Impact Development (LID) technology that can effectively control the storm runoff. However, its rainwater infiltration rate and storage capacity still require further enhancement. By setting a horizontal infiltration structure at the bottom of conventional rainwater seepage well (CSW), an enhanced seepage well (ESW) was proposed in this study, and its infiltration performances compared with the permeable pavement (PP) and the CSW were systemically investigated using static infiltration experiment and HYDRUS-2D simulation. The results showed that the infiltration efficiency of ESW was significantly higher than that of PP and CSW, and the process of water infiltrated through soil mainly controlled the macroscopic infiltration rate. The Nash-Sutcliff Efficient (NSE) index was used to evaluate the accuracy and reliability of the HYDRUS-2D model, and the results of NSE values greater than 0.75 (varied between 0.75 and 0.91) confirmed the applicability of HYDRUS-2D to describe correctly the hydraulic behavior of the ESW system. Simulation infiltration tests showed that the ESW performed a higher average infiltration rate and fewer total runoff volume than the CSW, indicating the effectively enhancement of the infiltration and water retention capacity of ESW, especially under heavy rainfall intensities. Additionally, the ESW system exhibited an excellent runoff-control and rainwater retention capacity in an actual rainfall scenario.

The drinking water supply system in many high rise buildings in densely populated cities consists of a complex labyrinth of copper pipes and brass fixtures (valves, meters, couplings). Lead contamination in these non-lead pipe systems can occur due to the presence of lead-soldered connections, and lead containing brass fixtures. The prediction of lead concentration characteristics of random daytime (RDT) samples in these high rise buildings has hitherto not been studied. The stochastic variation of lead concentration of RDT samples is studied by a coupling of 3-D and 1-D models and the Monte-Carlo Method. A 3-dimensional CFD model based on an equilibrium concentration ($E_0$) approach is used to simulate the leaching process from different lead sources. With the calibrated $E_0$ for different materials obtained from leaching experiments, the lead source strengths of leaded components in a water supply chain can be predicted by the 3D model as a function of stagnation time. Using the predicted distributed lead sources, the transport and mixing of lead in the turbulent pipe flow can be accurately simulated by a 1D advection–diffusion model. Using the Monte-Carlo method, a large number of simulations of consumer tap water Pb concentrations is performed using randomly sampled stagnation time, inter-use time, and flushing time. The computations are performed for two representative prototypes: (i) a full scale lead contaminated water supply chain; and (ii) a chain with only clean pipes and brass fixtures. The effect of stagnation time and flushing time before water use on tap Pb levels are investigated. The predicted range and distribution of RDT sample concentrations are validated by a three-year field data set (2017–2020) of the Hong Kong Water Supplies Department.

This paper describes application of airborne LiDAR bathymetry (ALB) with near-infrared and green pulsed lasers for gathering distributed vegetation conditions and topo-bathymetric data for rivers. For the lower Asahi River of Okayama Prefecture in Japan, the ALB data validity was verified using field observation data. This study also examined the applicability of ALB data for numerical simulations of the lower Asahi River flooding in early July 2018 in Japan, comparing simulated and observed data. Results demonstrated that the methodology for this study works well for parameterization of distributed vegetation on a reach scale. This study also applied numerical tests to investigate the effects of vegetation establishment on flood control plans for the lower Asahi River using parameters validated for flood flow simulations. Results demonstrate that the predicted water level markedly exceeds the high water level because of thick vegetation presently established along few-kilometer-long upstream sections of the targeted river reach. Therefore, we conclude that the present findings can support cost-effective management tasks for vegetated rivers.

Hydraulic structures disrupt fish migration thereby contributing to declines in fish populations around the world. Methods for piping fish upstream over dams can offer much steeper lift than conventional fishways. We describe the lifting mechanism of a tube fishway, demonstrated using numerical modelling, verified by a physical model. Efficacy is demonstrated by safely lifting two species of Australian native fish over 8 m up an embankment. Significant volumes of water can be transported from a chamber at the foot of a dam over its crest using simple conduits and two valves. Unsteady flow contributes entirely or significantly to the volume of water lifted. We explore how this piped system could be scaled up, while controlling turbulence impacts on fish. We propose new methods of characterising hydraulic efficiency for fishways that recognise the energy used and the value of the water discharged.

Conflict between water demand and environmental flow requirements is a challenging aspect in the reservoir management. Hence, optimizing environmental flow regime is one of the most important tasks at downstream of the large dams. The present study proposes a coupled simulation–optimization method based on the wetted perimeter method as an assessment method of the environmental flow and optimization of the reservoir operation to minimize difference between habitat loss and water demand loss using different metaheuristic algorithms. Moreover, the fuzzy TOPSIS as the decision-making system was applied for ranking the optimization algorithms. Indices including reliability index, vulnerability index, root mean square error and mean absolute error were utilized as criteria to measure the system performance and to select the best algorithm. Based on the results, gravity search algorithm (GSA) was the best method to optimize environmental flow regime at downstream of the reservoir in the case study. The proposed method is able to optimize environmental flow to minimize conflicts between human’s needs and aquatic’s needs considering storage constraints in the reservoir management. The proposed method might minimize negotiations between environmental managers and stakeholders. Furthermore, it should be noted that original wetted perimeter method is not able to provide optimal environmental flow regime based on a balance between users and constraints in the reservoir management such as storage constraints. The proposed method converts wetted perimeter method from an assessment method to a simulation–optimization method for optimizing environmental flow at downstream of the reservoirs.