WEB MAPPING ARCHITECTURES BASED ON OPEN SPECIFICATIONS AND FREE AND OPEN SOURCE SOFTWARE IN THE WATER DOMAIN

The availability of water-related data and information across different geographical and jurisdictional scales is of critical importance for the conservation and management of water resources in the 21st century. Today information assets are often found fragmented across multiple agencies that use incompatible data formats and procedures for data collection, storage, maintenance, analysis, and distribution. The growing adoption of Web mapping systems in the water domain is reducing the gap between data availability and its practical use and accessibility. Nevertheless, more attention must be given to the design and development of these systems to achieve high levels of interoperability and usability while fulfilling different end user informational needs. This paper first presents a brief overview of technologies used in the water domain, and then presents three examples of Web mapping architectures based on free and open source software (FOSS) and the use of open specifications (OS) that address different users' needs for data sharing, visualization, manipulation, scenario simulations, and map production. The purpose of the paper is to illustrate how the latest developments in OS for geospatial and water-related data collection, storage, and sharing, combined with the use of mature FOSS projects facilitate the creation of sophisticated interoperable Web-based information systems in the water domain

SMART - IWRM - Sustainable Management of Available Water Resources with Innovative Technologies - Integrated Water Resources Management in the Lower Jordan Rift Valley : Final Report Phase II (KIT Scientific Reports ; 7698)

SMART was a multi-lateral research project with partners from Germany, Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian Territories. The overall goal was to develop a transferable approach for Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) in the water shortage region of the Lower Jordan Valley. The innovative aspect addressed all available water resources: groundwater and surface waters, but also wastewater, brackish water and flood water that need to be treated for use

Integration of water ecosystem services provision objectives into forest management planning models

Mestrado Mediterranean Forestry and Natural Resources Management (MEDFOR) - Instituto Superior de Agronomia - ULIn recent years, an integration of water production values for forest ecosystems into forest management planning models has become increasingly important in sustainable forest management. The reason is that both for surface and groundwater resources quantity and quality – forests play a vital role. The main objective of this work is to produce an analysis of forest management planning methods that have been implemented the most frequently for assessing an optimal integrated forest and water management for forested catchments. The research was developed within the framework of Alternative Models and Robust Decision-Making for Future Forest Management (ALTERFOR) Project; being developed to assess Decision Support System (DSS) tools that support sustainable forest management by means of including a variety of ecosystem services. For that purpose, we use a taxonomy of water related ecosystem services based on the classification scheme estimated based on the findings of the project. The taxonomy is used to develop a query of relevant references from 2754 journals, encompassing 46 scientific categories, stored in the ISI Web of Science database over the last 30 years. Query results were analyzed, and decision-making methods were classified and assessed according to their supporting role to forest managers in addressing specific ecosystem services. As forest managers are often confronted with conflicting preferences by owners and stakeholders regarding ecosystem services target levels, the query will further address the potential of decision-making methods to facilitate negotiation and consensus buildingN/

The SWITCH transition manual

This study evaluated the potential for efficient treatment of domestic wastewater, while satisfying energy efficiency requirements. Various treatment systems and the influences of their physical configurations and operational characteristics on wastewater treatment and energy efficiency were initially considered and evaluated. Review of literature identified high rate anaerobic systems as viable low energy systems for domestic wastewater treatment, with reported high removal of influent chemical oxygen demand (COD) and high net energy balance for the anaerobic baffled reactor (ABR). Low energy recovery is reported in literature as a limitation of anaerobic domestic wastewater treatment, and anaerobic domestic wastewater treatment systems have failed to meet effluent discharge standards, and post-treatment using aerobic processes have been recommended in order to ensure high effluent quality. Therefore, the ABR was selected as a feasible option that can be developed as the first stage of an anaerobic-aerobic low energy domestic wastewater treatment system. The literature review also identified the net energy consumption per cubic metre (m3) of treated wastewater during the treatment process as an energy efficiency evaluation criterion.Energy efficiency for domestic wastewater treatment facilities should be achieved if efficient treatment performance can be sustained at ambient temperature, instead of the fixed mesophilic temperature that is commonly adopted in anaerobic treatment processes. To identify an energy efficient design of the ABR in terms of hydraulic retention time and operational temperature, the performance efficiencies of ABR bench models were monitored at ambient temperature and 37oC at hydraulic retention times (HRT) of 48, 36, 24, 12 and 6 hours, which corresponded to organic loading rates (OLR) of 1.25, 1.67, 2.5, 5.0 and 10.0 kg COD/m3 day. 88.43, 90.00, 84.03, 77.01 and 59.35% of the influent COD (mean = 2479.50 mg/L) were removed at 48, 36, 24, 12 and 6 hour HRTs, respectively, in the 37oC bench reactor, while 70.16, 70.36 and 74.99% of the influent COD were removed at 48, 36 and 24 hour HRTs, respectively, in the ambient temperature bench reactor. Steady state performance, in the form of stable pH values, was not observed in the ambient temperature reactor at 12 hours HRT before the end of the bench experiments. Retention of influent total solids was observed to correlate to hydraulic retention time, with increase retention of total solids corresponding to increase in hydraulic retention time. Furthermore, observed total solids retention in the ambient temperature reactor were less than the total solids retention in the 37oC reactor.Anaerobic reduction of domestic wastewater sludge and the corresponding methane production were also evaluated using bio-chemical methane potential (BMP) batch assays at ambient temperature and compared to a fixed mesophilic temperature of 37oC. Low reduction of volatile solids was observed in the BMP assays, with 40% at ambient temperature compared to 56% at 37oC for primary sludge, and 22% at ambient temperature compared to 38% at 37oC for secondary sludge. Critical limitations of the anaerobic stage at ambient temperature were determined to be the biological reduction and conversion of the organic contaminants to soluble COD and volatile fatty acids (VFA). Also, achieving and maintaining steady state performance required a longer time period at ambient temperature than at 37oC, potentially due to the slow growth of the anaerobic microorganisms at ambient temperature. These limitations indicate the need for long (≥ 24 hours) retention periods for efficient operation at ambient temperature. The ABR bench models were evaluated for energy efficiency with the identified energy efficiency criteria, and the operational condition with the highest energy efficiency was determined to be 12 hours HRT at 37oC. Finally, design criteria for the anaerobic stage of the anaerobic-aerobic system were proproposed, along with a process model as a preliminary step for future process research

Multilevel governance patterns and the protection of groundwater and drinking water in Florida and the Netherlands

This paper develops a model of ‘governance’ as an aid for comparing such\ud governance structures and applies these to a particular policy arena: policies\ud on the protection of groundwater and on drinking water quality in the\ud Netherlands and Florida.\ud The research questions examined by this paper are:\ud 1. Which elements make up a governance structure?\ud 2. In what ways do these elements influence each other?\ud 3. What are the differences between the multilevel structure of protection for\ud aquifers in Florida and the Netherlands, and how do these differences\ud relate to other differences in the governance structure?\ud The analysis in this paper has shown that ‘governance’ involves more\ud elements than policy objectives and the means to implement policy. These\ud elements are not simply the sum of individual aspects but are closely\ud interlinked. We have tried to illustrate how these interrelations work. The case\ud study we used for this was the comparison between the Netherlands and\ud Florida regarding the protection of the quality of groundwater and drinking\ud water. The high degree of similarity between both states highlights the\ud differences, which exist as well. The interrelations between these differences\ud can be understood by using our hypotheses of the mechanisms by which they\ud work

Modelling tools for cost-effective water management

Vlaanderen als regio wordt geconfronteerd met een hele reeks van waterbeheerskwesties zoals een ontoereikende oppervlaktewater- en grondwaterkwaliteit, een toenemend risico op overstromingen, sedimentbeheer en een slechte ecologische kwaliteit. Het identificeren van kosten-effectieve maatregelenprogramma’s die in staat zijn om deze kwesties geheel of gedeeltelijk op te lossen tegen zo laag mogelijke kosten is hierbij een belangrijke stap. De doelstelling van dit onderzoek is modellen en instrumenten te ontwikkelen die beleidsmakers ondersteunen bij het samenstellen van kosten-effectieve maatregelenprogramma’s voor waterbeleid. Belangrijk hierbij is dat de modellen enerzijds geschikt zijn om besluitvorming te ondersteunen op nationale of regionale schaal (macro-schaal), maar anderzijds ook gedetailleerd genoeg zijn om inzichten te geven op het lokale project-niveau (micro-schaal). Toepassingen die o.a. aan bod komen zijn een kosten-effectiviteitsanalyse voor oppervlaktewaterkwaliteit, een kosten-batenanalyse voor risico-gebaseerd overstromingsbeheer en hoe door de waardering van ecosysteemdiensten win-win situaties kunnen geïdentificeerd worden voor diverse wateraspecten gelijktijdig