Mechanically reclaiming abandoned saline soils: a numerical evaluation

Water quality / Groundwater / Simulation models / Calibrations / Water table / Water balance / Hydraulics / Soil reclamation / Soil water / Flow / Soil properties / Salinity / Pakistan / Punjab / Sindh

Strategies to mitigate secondary salinization in the Indus Basin of Pakistan: a selective review

Salinity control / Water table / River basins / Irrigation management / Water quality / Irrigation practices / Drainage / Sodic soils / Pakistan

Development of a Combined Quanity and Quality Model for Optimal Groundwater Management

Presented is a procedure for incorporating solute transport as linear constraints within computer models for optimizing regional groundwater extraction strategies. The MODCON modelling procedure uses linear goal programming, embedded linearized equations for flow and solute transport and a MOC simulation model. Assumed is 2D flow and solute transport and a dispersed conservative contaminant. The MODCON procedure develops steady groundwater extraction strategies that will satisfy future groundwater quality constraints while simultaneously causing future piezometric heads to be as close to current heads as possible. The procedure is applied to a 160 square mile area in southeastern Arkansas

Development of a combined quantity and quality model for optimal unsteady groundwater management

Presented is a procedure for incorporating solute transport as linear constraints within computer models for optimizing regional groundwater extraction strategies. The MODCON modelling procedure uses linear goal programming, embedded linearized equations for flow and solute transport and a MOC simulation model. Assumed is 20 flow and solute transport and a dispersed conservative contaminant. The MODCON procedure develops steady groundwater extraction strategies that will satisfy future groundwater quality constraints while simultaneously causing future piezometric heads to be as close to current heads as possible. The procedure is applied to a 160 square mile area in southeastern Arkansas

Development of linear water quality constraints for optimal groundwater management

Proposed is a procedure for incorporating solute transport as linear constraints within computer models for optimizing regional groundwater extraction strategies. . MODCON procedure uses linear goal programming. embedded linearized equations for flow and solute transport. and MOC simulation model. Assumed is 20 flow and solute transport. and a dispersed conservative contaminant

Irrigation application efficiency and uniformity of water distribution using multi-outlet pipe and resource conservation technologies

Irrigation experiments were conducted during November to April under wheat crop in the winter season of 2012-13 and 2013-14 in the farmer’s field at Galibkhedi village located in Karnal District, Haryana State, India. In the study, collapsible multi-outlet pipe (MOP) along with single outlets pipe (SOP) was tested in farmer’s field under wheat cultivation. Irrigation was carried out in five treatments including tillage (T) with SOP and MOP; zero-tillage (ZT) with SOP and MOP, and furrow irrigation with raised bed (FIRB). Iso-time profile of waterfront spreading and advance indicated that irrigation water distribution was uniform under the plot irrigated using MOP as compared to plot irrigated using SOP. In addition, water distribution was uniform under zero tilled plots as compared to tilled plot. Results implied that MOP has several advantages over SOP in terms of application efficiency (AE) and uniformity of water distribution. Average application efficiency for the first study year was found to be in the order of ZT-MOP (82.41%) > FIRB (76.79%) > ZT-SOP (75.25%) > T-MOP (74.85%) > T-SOP (69.79%). Average application efficiency for the second study year was found to be in the same order as first year with some deviation in values. In the second year values of mean application efficiencies were ZT-MOP (82.58%) > FIRB (77.13%) > ZT-SOP (73.04%) > T-MOP (69.65%) > T-SOP (66.13%). Overall, this study concludes that irrigation under wheat crop using collapsible multi-outlet pipe (MOP) with zero tillage practices is a suitable option for surface irrigation that accomplishes uniform distribution of water with higher application efficiency

Financial feasibility of end-user designed rainwater harvesting and greywater reuse systems for high water use households

© 2017, The Author(s). Water availability pressures, competing end-uses and sewers at capacity are all drivers for change in urban water management. Rainwater harvesting (RWH) and greywater reuse (GWR) systems constitute alternatives to reduce drinking water usage and in the case of RWH, reduce roof runoff entering sewers. Despite the increasing popularity of installations in commercial buildings, RWH and GWR technologies at a household scale have proved less popular, across a range of global contexts. For systems designed from the top-down, this is often due to the lack of a favourable cost-benefit (where subsidies are unavailable), though few studies have focused on performing full capital and operational financial assessments, particularly in high water consumption households. Using a bottom-up design approach, based on a questionnaire survey with 35 households in a residential complex in Bucaramanga, Colombia, this article considers the initial financial feasibility of three RWH and GWR system configurations proposed for high water using households (equivalent to >203L per capita per day). A full capital and operational financial assessment was performed at a more detailed level for the most viable design using historic rainfall data. For the selected configuration (‘Alt 2’), the estimated potable water saving was 44% (equivalent to 131m3/year) with a rate of return on investment of 6.5% and an estimated payback period of 23years. As an initial end-user-driven design exercise, these results are promising and constitute a starting point for facilitating such approaches to urban water management at the household scale

Salt, water and groundwater management models to determine sustainable cropping patterns in shallow saline groundwater regions of Australia

© Food Products PressThis article describes models which can consider the interactions between plants, soils, water, irrigation practices, crop yields, and economics under shallow, saline groundwater conditions. Personal computing capability has now made it possible to develop a range of interactive modeling tools based on existing and new biophysical concepts. In view of the large number of available models, it is not possible to cover all modeling efforts in a single article. Hence, the discussion in this article is limited to farm and irrigation area scale salt, water, and groundwater management models. It provides an introduction to the SWAGMAN suite of models that have been used in Australia to determine sustainable cropping patterns under shallow, saline water table conditions. Salient features and applications of a detailed process based model (SWAGMAN Destiny), a lumped hydrologic economic model (SWAGMAN Farm) and a distributed biophysical model (SWAGSIM) are provided.S. Khan, E. Xevi, W. S. Meye

Food Security as a Public Good: Oman’s Prospects

The recent phenomenal crisis in the financial sector and the surge in food prices have resurrected the debate on the role of government, in economic management and in particular in securing national food security. This paper briefly reviews the theoretical literature in favor of government intervention in the market to secure food security. It is argued that food security needs to be considered as a public good, hence justifying government intervention in supplying it. Sustaining the potential to domestically produce safe minimum amounts of a staple food should be considered as a national strategic objective to achieve food security. Wheat is a staple food in Oman and it has been a major crop in the farming systems of Oman. Wheat cultivation under present circumstances of crop prices, yield, agricultural technology and resource availability in Oman’s commercial farming is not viable, without government support. With the use of a linear programming model that simulates the farming systems; in a major agricultural region in Oman (Batinah region) the production subsidy that is required as an incentive to promote the cultivation of wheat is estimated. The wheat yield in Oman is considered as 3 Tons/Ha and world price of wheat is around 100 OR/Ton. Wheat cultivation under commercial farming would be viable if a subsidy of at least 414 OR/Ha (138 OR/Ton) is provided. This subsidy can be instrumented as an input subsidy and/or price supports as Saudi Arabia had done (190 OR/Ton of wheat). If the wheat yield could be increased through technological and managerial means to global potential yield of 5 Tons/Ha then the price support needs to be at least 83 OR/Ton of wheat. The extent of its achievement in terms of extent of land cultivated and total domestic production of wheat, need to be considered in relation to the trade-off of fiscal cost and political choice of the degree of food security deemed as necessary to achieve