Efficacité de l'assainissement des eaux usées sur le bassin de la rivière Chaudière (Québec, Canada)

Le Québec a consacré des efforts techniques et financiers substantiels à l'assainissement des eaux usées municipales et à l'entreposage des déjections animales afin de satisfaire les demandes des citoyens en matière de restauration des usages des cours d'eau. L'assainissement de l'eau a, dans l'ensemble, par ses choix technologiques et administratifs, engendré des investissements publics dépassant 7,2 milliards de dollars et plus de 400 millions de dollars annuellement au chapitre de l'exploitation. Ces choix ont-ils permis d'atteindre un niveau de qualité de l'eau correspondant à un optimum social? À l'aide d'une étude de cas portant sur le bassin versant de la rivière Chaudière (Québec, Canada), cet article met en évidence les facteurs qui ont nuit à l'efficacité des politiques de contrôle de la pollution de l'eau au Québec. Sur ce bassin, 125 M$ont été consacrés entre 1981 et 1992 à l'érection d'usines d'épuration utilisant différents types de traitement, 8,6 M$ ont été alloués pour la construction de structures d'entreposage de fumiers et le service de la dette pour l'assainissement des eaux usées municipales atteindrait près de 527 M$selon une hypothèse de financement de 25 ans. La performance des usines d'épuration a permis de réduire significativement les apports au cours d'eau, notamment en DBO5 et en phosphore. Enfin, cette performance et le coût total de l'assainissement municipal sur le bassin de la Rivière Chaudière permettent d'évaluer, sur la base d'une relation coût-efficacité, qu'il y aurait un niveau optimal de qualité de l'eau pouvant résulté de l'établissement d'infrastructures d'assainissement des eaux usées municipales. Ainsi, dans l'optique d'une prise en charge sociale du problème collectif de la pollution de l'eau sur la base du bassin versant, il serait approprié que les gestionnaires et les usagers-contribuables de la ressource-eau, prennent en compte, non pas uniquement les objectifs de rejets, mais également les coûts et les performances de l'ensemble des usines d'épuration sur le bassin afin de retirer le maximum de charges polluantes là où les équipements sont les plus performants.Considerable technical and financial effort has been invested by Québec in the cleaning up of municipal wastewaters and storage of animal manure to meet demands by citizens to restore the province's rivers to their former state. Water pollution control has required technological and management choices that have resulted overall in public investments in excess of$7.2 billion, with over $400 million going to operation costs annually. Have these choices enabled Québec to attain a water quality level consistent with a social optimum?Based on a case study taken from the Chaudière river watershed, Québec, Canada, this article posits two conditions for achieving a social optimum and underscores the factors that have offset the efficiency of water pollution control policies in Québec. According to the data collected on this watershed, between 1981 and 1992,$125 M was invested in the construction of sewage water treatment plants using various treatment methods, while $8.6 M went towards manure storage facilities. On the whole,$527 M is expected to be spent over 25 years to service the debt for municipal wastewater treatment within the watershed.While inputs of pollutants, especially BOD5 and phosphorus, have dropped significantly with the construction of the wastewater treatment plants, levels of residual pollution in the watershed remain high. It is suspected that total residual loads of phosphorus from municipal and agricultural sources are still well above the loads eliminated through wastewater treatment. If they are to achieve an efficient watershed-based approach to water management, decision-makers are faced with two conditions: the first addresses intersectoral efficiency in controlling pollution in a watershed and the second involves minimizing intrasectoral costs of pollution control. The condition explains the administrative and technical choices made as well as the importance of the political market in allocating resources to water pollution control among the socioeconomic sectors responsible for water quality deterioration. The condition explains how to minimize the costs in a specific socioeconomic sector among the available water treatment solutions. Using performance data from wastewater treatment plants and the total cost of wastewater treatment in the Chaudière river watershed, it can be assumed, based on a cost efficiency ratio, that an optimal level of water quality should occur as a result of the establishment of municipal wastewater treatment infrastructures. However, it would appear from the results obtained that Québec's water treatment program has deviated from a social optimum, i.e., restoration costs have not been shared equitably among users/polluters within the watershed, and measures to ensure maximum removal of pollution at minimum cost have not been secured. The play of political forces is central to the allocation of resources among pollution sources. Without a proper hard core concept, a water pollution control policy will not be able to elaborate the best solutions oriented towards attaining a social optimum. In the context of the high residual pollution loads within the watershed, there remains the issue of what water quality level is desirable at what cost, particularly with respect to the community's contribution to date and the efficiency of the response strategies that have been implemented. Now that wastewater treatment infrastructures have been set up, and a watershed-based approach to water management becomes effective, water resource managers and users/taxpayers should turn their attention away from discharge objectives only to focus also on the costs and performance of the watershed's treatment plants as a whole, so that removal of pollutant loads at high-performance facilities may be maximized

Les sciences de l'eau : présent et futur

Les sciences de l'eau connaissent actuellement un développement accéléré. Plusieurs facteurs contribuent à cet élargissement de la base de connaissances explicatives et instrumentales sur l'eau. On note, par exemple,1. les investissements accrus dans la mise au point de systèmes de mesure permettant l'étude approfondie des propriétés de l'eau,2. l'expansion considérable des approches mathématique et systémique à l'interprétation des données, ou encore3. les progrès récents des outils informatiques qui ont favorisé le développement et l'usage des modèles de prédiction et ainsi, l'amélioration significative des connaissances sur la chimie, la biologie et la toxicologie.D'un autre côté, la croissance et la diversification des problèmes sociaux reliés à la raréfaction de l'eau viennent multiplier les domaines d'application des connaissances en vue de trouver des solutions durables aux problèmes. Dans cet article, on s'interroge, dans un tel contexte d'élargissement, sur l'évolution des sciences de l'eau au cours des prochaines années en mettant en évidence les problèmes socio-économiques dont la solution fait appel aux connaissances actuelles, à leur raffinement par les applications ou encore, à de nouvelles capacités techniques d'interprétation des phénomènes hydrologiques. On y distingue entre les activités qui seront entreprises pour résoudre des questions scientifiques fondamentales pouvant se justifier par des retombées possibles pour la société (la poussée scientifique) de celles qui seront engagées pour élaborer des solutions à des problèmes socio-économiques d'importance (les besoins socio-économiques de connaissances). On met ensuite en évidence les facteurs qui interviendront pour favoriser l'épanouissement des initiatives scientifiques, et on évalue l'effet de ces facteurs sur l'orientation de ces initiatives. On pose ainsi l'hypothèse que ce serait surtout la solution des problèmes socio-économiques, en conjugaison avec les aptitudes scientifiques actuelles, qui orienteront les développements des sciences de l'eau dans l'avenir. Enfin, on présente une approche émergente pouvant aider à comprendre l'évolution des sciences de l'eau. Ce modèle de représentation de la dynamique des initiatives scientifiques est caractérisé par deux pôles d'attraction relevant de la solution des problèmes sociaux reliés à la ressource : l'un en relation avec les besoins de connaissances pour la gestion de l'eau et l'autre lié aux besoins spécifiques de connaissances pour l'administration publique de l'eau.The water sciences are now entering a process of accelerated development. Numerous factors can explain this rapid evolution : a) the important investments in measuring systems that now allowed the characterization of water properties, b) the considerable expansion of mathematical and systemic approaches to the interpretation of data, c) the recent progress in interface tolls for computer modeling and the subsequent diversification of simulation models and the remarkable development in water chemistry, biology and toxicology that followed, have all largely contributed to the actual broadening of the theoretical and applied knowledge base on water. Furthermore, the scientific and technical efforts unfolded in order to explain social problems related to water shortages and to find sustainable solutions have also contributed to the diversification and deepening of this wide knowledge base. In this article, taking into consideration the deepening and diversification of the related knowledge base, we question ourselves on the evolution of water sciences in the future. We first underlined the socioeconomic problems that can be solved either by the application of actual knowledge, its refinement by learning from applications, or by the development of new technical ability for the interpretation of hydrological phenomena. We then distinguished between the activities undertake to solve scientific problems justified by long term social benefits (the science push) from those that aim to find solutions to important socioeconomic problems (the social needs for scientific knowledge). We then look at the different factors that help the achievement of research enterprises and explain the effect of those factors on the orientation of scientific projects. Doing this, we formulate the hypothesis that it is the search for solutions of socioeconomic problems that, on the basis of actual scientific ability, that will be the prime factor for the evolution of water sciences in the future, its dynamic and orientation. Finally, we propose a general approach that can help the understanding of the evolution of water sciences. This model represent the dynamic of scientific initiatives as affected by two attracting poles : the first pole is related to the needs for scientific knowledge for water management problems (i.e. the rational and engineering approach to water problems), and the second being the needs for the specific knowledge required for public administration of water (i.e. the policy and political approach to water problems).In general, we may conclude that the water sciences can be conceived as the scientific constructs generated by the application of particular scientific basic knowledge to water and its relations with natural and human systems. Those scientific constructs on water and its systemic interactions with terrestrial and human systems develop from this process are not as well structured as the sub-domains that emerge under traditional domains like biophysics, biochemistry, basic hydrology, political economy, or so. They are coherent sets of inter-disciplinary constructs elaborated to explain or predict complex natural processes or systems of relations between human and nature, mostly in response to real or perceived social needs. Is this to say that the scientific works on water will not succeed in the establishment of well-structured scientific subdomains like hydrology for example ? In spite of the evident progress, natural water and its relation with nature and human systems will remain for a long time applications domains of the fundamental knowledge that have been developed in the basic or applied sciences. Those applications will certainly produced new theories or original basic knowledge with high explicative or predictive values. In this manner, the object of the applications (water) and its context (natural and human systems) are the prime determinant of knowledge development, while in comparison, in basic sciences, it is the knowledge per se and its related instrumental capacities that mostly determine its own evolution. The development rhythm of technical and scientific knowledge on water is strongly influenced by the attention that society brings upon the resource. In the future, social preoccupations about water should increase considerably in light of its growing scarcity and the collective obligations to cope with higher probabilities of related extreme events. The type of knowledge that should developed will depend upon the specific approaches to social problem solving retained by political and administrative authorities, while in turn, those approaches will be influenced by research and development done in the field of management and public administration of water

Choix multicritère de procédés d'épuration des eaux usées municipales

Les stations d'épuration des eaux usées municipales du Québec, comme ailleurs au Canada et aux États Unis, sont en général peu efficaces sur le plan énergétique. Il est donc possible de concevoir des hypothèses de chaînes épuratoires améliorées au plan de leur efficacité énergétique et de leur performance globale en y introduisant, d'une part, diverses MEEE et, d'autre part, certains procédés unitaires améliorant l'épuration. Cependant, le problème de choisir, parmi ces hypothèses de chaînes d'épuration, celle correspondant au procédé le plus adéquat pour prendre en charge une situation donnée, demeure entier. Cet article analyse ce problème de choix pour les stations d'épuration de capacité comprise entre 5,000 m3/d (≈ 5000 personnes) et 100,000 m3/d (≈ 100,000 personnes). En faisant l'hypothèse, d'un côté, que l'ajout des mesures d'efficacité énergétique peut améliorer la consommation énergétique d'une chaîne d'épuration, et d'un autre côté, que l'insertion de segments de procédés peut contribuer à améliorer leur performance globale, nous avons élaboré, à partir des stations d'épuration de types Biofiltration, Physico-chimique, Réacteurs Biologiques séquentiels (deux variantes), Boues activées et Étangs aérés, six (6) hypothèses de chaînes épuratoires (chaînes 1 à 6) respectant les exigences opérationnelles et épuratoires et nous les avons comparées entre elles, sur la base d'une analyse multicritère d'aide à la décision, en vue d'en déterminer les plus performantes. Cette analyse multicritère intègre les aspects techniques, énergétiques, économiques, etc. et prend en compte les préférences du(des) décideur(s) dans le processus de choix. Les résultats obtenus montrent que, parmi les six hypothèses de chaînes étudiées, les trois premières positions sont occupées par les chaînes 3, 1 et 4 respectivement. Ce type d'analyse pourrait jouer un rôle complémentaire à une étude technico-économique visant le choix de technologies d'épuration.Quebec municipal wastewater treatment facilities, like those elsewhere in Canada and the United States, generally are low efficiency energy consumers (ELECTRIC POWER RESEARCH INSTITUTE (EPRI), 1993; OWEN, 1982; ONTARIO-HYDRO, 1993; METCALF and EDDY, INC., 1992, SASSEVILLE et al., 1995). The work of METCALF and EDDY, INC. (1992) and of EPRI (1993) concluded that it would be possible to substantially reduce electricity demand and to improve the utilization of electrical energy in the municipal wastewater treatment processes by introducing Electricity Saving Measures (ESMs) in the processes and their management.In the province of Quebec, given the potential savings linked to the reduction of electricity consumption in municipal wastewater treatment facilities, and the progressive expansion of the province's wastewater treatment facilities, the adoption of energetically efficient wastewater treatment technologies is particularly timely. SASSEVILLE et al. (1995) estimated that it would be possible to save 5 M $at the present level of wastewater treatment, based on a cost of about 24 M$ for the 400 GWh of electricity annually consumed in the municipal wastewater treatment facilities. This saving would come solely from the implementation of appropriate energy-saving measures.In hypothesizing on one hand that adding energy-saving measures can improve the energy consumption of a wastewater treatment chain, and on the other hand that the introduction of segments of processes can contribute in improving overall performance, we have elaborated from existing wastewater treatment facilities six hypotheses of liquid treatment chains that respect operational and regulation requirements, on the basis of the experience developed in the operation of municipal wastewater treatment facilities. The six hypothetical treatment chains were elaborated from facilities of the following types: biofiltration (chain 1), physico-chemical (chain 2), sequencing biological (batch) reactors system A (chain 3), sequencing biological (batch) reactors system B (chain 4), activated sludge (chain 5) and aerated lagoons (chain 6). The energy-saving measures utilized in the elaboration of these hypothetical treatment chains were chosen on the basis of a conjunctive analysis (KIBI et al., 1997). However, the problem of choosing among these treatment chains the one corresponding to the most adequate process for a particular situation is still present. The present article analyzes this choice for wastewater treatment facilities of a capacity between 5 000 m3/d (≈ 5 000 persons) and 100 000 m3/d (≈ 100 000 persons).How then to choose the most efficient of these hypothetical municipal wastewater treatment chains?Generally, the choice of the treatment technologies is done on the basis of single-criterion mathematical models: for example, the reduction of construction costs, or of exploitation and maintenance costs (ECKENFELDER, 1982; PINEAU et al., 1985; WANG and WANG, 1979; TYTECA et al., 1977). There are other approaches based on dynamic simulation models or on technological and econometric analyses (HYDRO-QUÉBEC, 1993; MACRAE 1989; LESSARD, 1989; BROCKTON, 1987; HOLDREN, 1987; FOSBERG and MUKHOPADHYAY, 1981; REID, CROWTHER and PARTNERS, 1978; KLEMETSON and GRENNEY, 1976).These different approaches are often insufficient to distinguish the real value of the different technological options. Furthermore, they do not take into account many important factors (technological, economic, financial and environmental, ergonomic and socio-political) that affect their implementation and should be considered in identifying an acceptable and viable solution.The multicriteria approach of decision-making advocated in this article can mitigate this difficulty. It will take into account key factors in the conception and operation of treatment technologies, especially energy and environmental factors, likely to give rise to efficient treatment facilities from both an energy and a treatment point of view. However the analysis of decisional factors to consider in this multicriteria analysis gives rise to a particular problem. They affect the decision that can be appreciated by deterministic relationships, offering a high level of certainty as to its evaluation, while others have a non-deterministic nature (uncertainty and imprecision). Research using the multicriteria analysis approach has been performed in similar situations over the last twenty years, in some cases applied to the environmental and energy sectors (e.g. KEENEY and NAIR 1977; ROY and VINCKE 1981; TEGHEM and KUNSCH 1985; SIMOS 1990; HANSON 1991; ROUSSEAU and MARTEL 1994). Here again, these approaches have limits since the cases were treated either in a situation of certainty or a situation of uncertainty and imprecision. The proposed model deals with the case of certainty and uncertainty at the same time, therefore improving the applicability of the multicriteria approach in the situation under study. The solution retained consists of applying this type of modelling in order to classify from the best to the worst, the six hypothetical treatment chains. This approach utilizes in the modelling process, fourteen evaluation criteria, various criteria weights, quantitative and qualitative evaluations, as well as the indifference, preference and veto thresholds. The main steps of the model are the construction of evaluated outclass relationships and the exploitation of these outclass relationships. The multicriteria aggregation procedure utilizes an elaborated mathematical model based upon the methods of ELECTRE III (Roy, 1978) and PROMETHEE II (BRANS et al., 1984), as well as the works of DÉROT et al. (1994). The ranking of these treatment chain hypotheses, elaborated on an empirical level in consultation with the operators and others involved in wastewater treatment and obtained on the basis of this procedure, can discriminate among their overall performance characteristics rather well. It also emphasizes their energy efficiency, since the energy criteria have on average in the analysis a weight that is 28% higher than the other evaluation criteria. The results obtained show that the hypothetical chain 3 is ranked first, chain 1 occupies the second rank, whereas chain 4 is in the third rank. The last three ranks are occupied respectively by chains 6, 5 and 2.In a decisional and strategic approach, the first three treatment chain hypotheses can be considered overall as being the highest achievers. This result signifies that in the scope of investments related to the expansion of treatment facilities and the construction of facilities with a flow rate contained within the considered range, these three treatment chains (when considering different modification hypotheses), should be preferred over the other chains when the emphasis is on their overall performance including energy efficiency. However, other analyses would be necessary in the case of the construction of a new wastewater treatment facility with a flow rate above the level considered in this study.Generally, the results of this analysis can assist in discriminating among the behaviors of the technologies considered, and in judging their relative performance in the investments of the construction of new wastewater treatment facilities, in addition to a technico-economic analysis. Overall, the multicriteria model described in this study identified a compromise solution between evaluations of a different and conflicting nature. This result demonstrates that this type of analysis is appropriate for tackling multidimensional problems

New insight into the role of phosphodiesterase 3A in porcine oocyte maturation

BACKGROUND: The ovulatory surge of gonadotropins triggers oocyte maturation and rupture of the ovarian follicle. The resumption of nuclear maturation in the oocyte from the prophase stage is characterized by germinal vesicle breakdown (GVBD). It has previously been shown that specific inhibition of cAMP degradation by PDE3 prevents the resumption of oocyte meiosis. However, no report has characterized the activity of PDE3 in the porcine oocyte, or the implication of the cAMP-PDE3 pathway in the entire nuclear maturation process. In this study, PDE3 activity in the oocyte was assessed during in vitro maturation (IVM) and the possible roles of the cAMP-PDE3 pathway in the resumption and progression of meiosis were investigated in terms of different models of oocyte maturation. RESULTS: Cyclic AMP-degrading PDE activity was detected in the cumulus-oocyte complex (COC) and was partially inhibited by a specific PDE3 inhibitor, cilostamide. When measured only in the denuded oocyte, PDE activity was almost completely inhibited by cilostamide, suggesting that cAMP-PDE3 activity is the major cAMP-PDE in porcine oocytes. PDE3A mRNA was detected by RT-PCR. PDE3 activity did not vary significantly during the early hours of IVM, but a maximum was observed at 13 hours. In cumulus-oocyte complexes, meiosis resumed after 20.81 hours of culture. PDE3 inhibition no longer maintained meiotic arrest if sustained beyond 17.65 hours of IVM, 3 hours prior to resumption of meiosis. Thereafter, PDE3 inhibition progressively lost its efficacy in GVBD. When the protein phosphatase 1 and 2A inhibitor okadaic acid was continuously or transiently (3 hours) present during IVM, meiosis resumed prematurely; PDE3 inhibition was unable to prevent GVBD. However, PDE3 inhibition in COC treated with OA for 3 hours significantly delayed meiosis at the intermediate stage. CONCLUSION: The present investigation has demonstrated that PDE3A is the major cAMP-degrading PDE in the oocyte. It regulates the resumption of meiosis until 3 hours prior to GVBD and transiently affects meiotic progression

Using Patient Registries to Identify Triggers of Rare Diseases

Mapping the distribution of patients and analyzing disease clusters is an effective method in epidemiology, where the non-random aggregation of patients is carefully investigated. This can aid in the search for clues to the etiology of diseases, particularly the rare ones. Indeed, with the increased incidence of rare diseases in certain populations and/or geographic areas and with proper analysis of common exposures, it is possible to identify the likely promoters/triggers of these diseases at a given time. In this chapter, we will highlight the appropriate methodology and demonstrate several examples of cluster analyses that lead to the recognition of environmental, occupational and communicable preventable triggers of several rare diseases

Dickey-Lincoln School Lakes Project Environmental Impact Statement: Appendix E: Aquatic Ecosystem and Fisheries Studies (Supplement)

Sediment mercury concentrations higher than levels normall y considered trace or background were encountered up to 80 cm belo w the sediment-water interface in samples obtained from four oligotrophi c lakes in northern Maine . These lakes are in three different watershed s and are as far as 65 km apart . The values reported are far lower than levels reported elsewhere from contaminated sites . The distributio n and magnitude of the sediment concentrations encountered suggest long-ter m diffuse mercury inputs to the lakes from the watersheds . In addition , concentrations up to twice as high in near-surface sediments as in sediments from deeper within the core samples suggest additiona l cultura l inputs . A likely source woul d incude input from contaminated precipitation , as described for remote regions of NY (11) and NH (12

Hemagglutinating Encephalomyelitis Coronavirus Infection in Pigs, Argentina

We describe an outbreak of vomiting, wasting, and encephalomyelitis syndrome in piglets in Argentina, caused by porcine hemagglutinating encephalomyelitis coronavirus (PHE-CoV) infection. Diagnosis was made by epidemiologic factors, pathologic features, immunohistochemistry, reverse transcription–PCR, and genomic sequencing. This study documents PHE-CoV infection in South America

Environmental and Other Extrinsic Risk Factors Contributing to the Pathogenesis of Cutaneous T Cell Lymphoma (CTCL)

The applications of disease cluster investigations in medicine have developed rather rapidly in recent decades. Analyzing the epidemiology of non-random aggregation of patients with a particular disease fostered identification of environmental and external exposures as disease triggers and promoters. Observation of patient clusters and their association with nearby exposures, such as Dr. John Snow's astute mapping analysis in the mid-1800's, which revealed proximity of cholera patients in London to a contaminated water pump infected with Vibrio cholerae, have paved the way for the field of epidemiology. This approach enabled the identification of triggers for many human diseases including infections and cancers. Cutaneous T-cell lymphomas (CTCL) represent a group of non-Hodgkin lymphomas that primarily affect the skin. The detailed pathogenesis by which CTCL develops remains largely unknown. Notably, non-random clustering of CTCL patients was reported in several areas worldwide and this rare malignancy was also described to affect multiple members of the same family. These observations indicate that external factors are possibly implicated in promoting CTCL lymphomagenesis. Here, we review the epidemiology of CTCL worldwide and the clinical characteristics of CTCL patients, as revealed by global epidemiological data. Further, we review the known risk factors including sex, age, race as well as environmental, infectious, iatrogenic and other exposures, that are implicated in CTCL lymphomagenesis and discuss conceivable mechanisms by which these factors may trigger this malignancy