Special Issue "Sustainable Water Management"

Guest Editor
Dr. Miklas Scholz
Institute for Infrastructure and Environment, School of Engineering, The University of Edinburgh, William Rankine Building, The King´s Buildings, Mayfield Road, Edinburgh, EH9 3JL, UK
Website: http://webdb.ucs.ed.ac.uk/see/staff/staff.cfm?person=mscholz
E-Mail:
Interests: stormwater management; runoff control; filtration; wetlands; sustainable water management

Sustainable water management is part of sustainable development; meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own water needs. Achieving sustainable water management requires a multidisciplinary and holistic approach in which technical, environmental, economic, landscape aesthetic, societal and cultural issues are addressed. Further research is required to guide the development of appropriate sustainable water management measures, strategies and policies.

The wider research community is therefore invited to contribute to this special issue by submitting comprehensive critical reviews and original research articles.

Submission Information

All papers should be submitted to sustainability@mdpi.org. To be published continuously until the deadline and papers will be listed together at the special issue website.

Submitted papers should not have been published nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere. All papers are refereed through a peer-review process. A guide for authors is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is a new international, peer-reviewed, quarterly open access journal published by Molecular Diversity Preservation International.

Article Processing Charges (APC) for publication in this open access journal are waived for well-prepared manuscripts submitted by 30 June 2010. English correction or formatting fees of 250 CHF (Swiss Francs) will be charged in certain cases for those paper accepted for publication, that require extensive additional formatting and/or English corrections.

• Sustainability
• Sustainable development
• Water supply
• Water treatment
• Wastewater treatment
• Storm water management
• Natural treatment methods
• Wetlands
• Management
• Strategies and policies
• Global change
• Flood retention structures

Type of Paper: Article
Title: A Biophysical Model of Energy and Water Balance: Analyses and Prospects
Authors: A. Perrier¹and A.Tuzet²
Affiliations: ¹ National Agronomic Institute Paris-Grignon, University Pierre and Marie Curie, UPMC Paris VI)
² National Agronomic research Institute, EGC Grignon
Abstract: Predicting with good reliability water balance and water used for sustainable watershed or regional basin through present time and particularly in near future, is always a major task. With such objectives, a robust well-adapted biophysical model seems essential. Bilhyna is a water budget model that has been developed, in particular for application in agricultural water management. This model is generic and adapted to any kinds of soil-plant systems such as agricultural lands or grasslands, even woody spaces. It can be used to assess available water supply and sustainability of natural or rural spaces and also to follow real situations in order to forecast technical agricultural actions as irrigation scheduling.
Bilhyna requires classical meteorological forcing data and also few soil and vegetation parameters. It includes a leaf area index biophysical model for vegetation with moisture stress reductions. We focus one's attention on all the water balance terms: soil evaporation, plant transpiration, plant water interception, soil water infiltration, run off, soil water content profile and deep drainage. Water balance is monitored through a determinist model of bare soil evaporation and a physical model of crop transpiration integrating aerodynamic and energetic effects due to plant development and stomatal regulation according to soil water depletion. The instantaneous water infiltration is calculated using the Green and Ampt method. Runoff occurred when rainfall rate exceeds soil-infiltrating rate. The redistribution of water in unsaturated soil is described by Richard's solution giving the soil profile drainage. Daily values of interception, infiltration, runoff, evapotranspiration and recharge are estimated under different climate conditions and different soil hydraulic properties during long simulating periods (almost fifty years due to natural climatic variability).
We have used Bilhyna to analyse water consumption with different crop rotations and climatic conditions. The climatic conditions of Beauce plain area from 2002 to 2004 are used by referring to three different sets of soil and plant parameters to provide daily outputs for testing the model. Results showed that the amount of soil water content is affected by the amount of annual rainfall and also the succession of vegetation covers including re-growths after yield. Results comparisons between different rotations give the respective amount of water saved that it is possible to expect according to climatic variability. With these simulations, we can also quantify the changes in amount of water saved when there is less irrigation according to the maximum growth reduction acceptable. Results show that spatial soil variability and maximum available soil water content contribute to modify crop water requirement and to slightly modulate the mean water durability. Water balance simulations on wheat and corn crop show for a summer crop greater water requirements than for a winter crop, but the annual water availability balance (net drainage, runoff minus irrigation) is likely similar.
Using regional climatic changes forecasting, simulations with different climatic scenario (Meteo France) show that there will be a tendency to small recharge decrease, but with some more extreme dry periods affecting mainly summer crop. Such results are widely dependent on prediction reliability and less on the energetic and water balance model. At regional scales, answer will be also under dependence of soil variability and prospective about management on durable development and rural space fittings.

Type of Paper: Article
Title: Water Allocation and Water Markets in Chile: From Neoliberalism toward Sustainability
Authors: Matthew D. Davis ^1,* and Miguel A. Mariño ²
Affiliations: ¹ Senior Civil and Environmental Engineer, CAL Engineering Management. Postal Address: 73 Almorah Road, Epsom, Auckland City 1003, New Zealand
² Distinguished Professor Emeritus, Department of Land, Air, and Water Resources and Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Postal Address: 139 Veihmeyer Hall (LAWR), University of California, 1 Shields Avenue, Davis, California, 95616-8628, USA
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; Email: mddavis67nz@yahoo.com or matthew.davis@cal.woosh.co.nz. Tel.: +64 9 27 337 8696; Fax: +64 9 630 7619
Abstract: Initial water rights allocation and water market reallocation in Chile are explained in the context of sustainable water management. Water market studies performed during the last 15-years are summarized. From 1981 to 2005, allocation of initial water rights reflected a combination of recognizing existing use rights and laissez-faire grants of unassigned water without regard to use or justification. The strong market emphasis and permissiveness of initial allocation in the 1981 Water Code was tempered somewhat by parallel water legislation enacted since the 1990s and a decade long debate to modify the Water Code. The modification became law 1 January 2006, which included beneficial use and justification clauses for new water rights. Water distribution management is characterized by broad private-sector involvement based on historical participation in agricultural communities and reinforced in the Water Code. Market activity varies across the country and is largely limited to surface to surface transactions involving adjacent and/or upstream to downstream farms; some cases of agricultural to urban transactions occur. Secure water rights have provided benefit, while water rights transactions have produced positive economic benefits and deferral of costly infrastructure in limited locations. The reasons for limited transactions are presented. At the same time, the water rights system has produced adverse economic, environmental, and social effects, with initial water rights allocations producing more detrimental effects than water market transactions to date. Several recognized legal deficiencies are being addressed, moving the neoliberal influenced water management model towards a more sustainable water use system, albeit at a slow pace. Lessons for others reformulating water rights allocation and introducing water markets are briefly presented.
Keywords: Chile, economics, environment, efficiency, equity, social, water allocation, water markets

Title: Complexation Reactions based Membrane Processes as a Sustainable Approach in Water Treatment
Author: Raffaele Molinari, et al.
Affiliation: Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials, University of Calabria, Via P. Bucci, 44/A, I-87030 Rende (CS)-Italy; E-Mail: r.molinari@unical.it
Abstract: Sustainable management of water is today vital owing to population growth, industrial developments and other advancements, mainly in developing countries. Water and wastewater can be treated before their use or re-use employing complexation reactions as the basis of advanced membrane processes named Polymer Assisted Ultrafiltration (PAUF) and Sandwich Liquid Membranes (SwLM). In this paper the fundamental chemical principles and the process parameters to operate such processes will be described. Then the removal and recovery of metal ions (e.g. copper(II) and nickel(II)) and water recycling by using the PAUF process will be treated by reviewing mainly our experimental data. Concerning the other type of process the SwLM will be compared with the Supported Liquid Membrane (SLM) in the separation of two types of pollutants: i) organic, such as drugs (e.g. Gemfibrozil); ii) inorganic ions (e.g. Cu(II)).
Keywords: Wastewater treatment; Supported Liquid Membrane; Sandwich Liquid Membrane, Sustainable water management.

Title: Stormwater Management in a Changing Area – The Future Convention for the Emscher River Catchment
Author: Ulrike Raasch and Michael Becker
Abstract: The drainage system in the catchment area of the Emscher is undergoing complete remediation since the 1990s. Striving for integrated planning, the Emschergenossenschaft works intensively on the realization of a sustainable stormwater management (ssm) within the complete river basin. Numerous projects show the high level of development of the different possible concepts and prove that

• the combined sewer system can be significantly relieved by targeted close-to-nature measures at relatively low levels of expenditure
• the natural dynamics of the new bodies of water can be improved by ssm and
• the municipal landscaping benefits resulting from designed ssm projects.

In the so-called disconnection (of stormwater from the sewer system) lies an enormous potential for the municipalities as well as for the Emschergenossenschaft, but it can only be realized working on a joint strategy. Therefore in 2005 the Future Convention for Stormwater (FCS) has been signed by the environmental agency, all mayors of the Emscher catchment and the Emschergenossenschaft to underline the aim of 15 % disconnection of stormwater runoff in the combined sewer system until the end of the remediation process in 2020. Referring to communication of the goals of this project, this is a process of mainly two steps, as the agreement with the local authorities is necessary for planning and permission processes, but for the realization of concrete projects contact to and conviction of owners of paved area is necessary.

Title: Water Sustainability: Prediction of Basin to Continental Scale Blue, Green and Brown Water Resources with the SWAT Ecohydrologic Model
Authors: J.G. Arnold, P.M. Allen, K. Abbaspour, R. Srinivasan and M. Di Luzio; E-Mail: Jeff.Arnold@ARS.USDA.GOV (J.G.A.)
Abstract: Sustainability can be defined as development and use of water resources in a manner that can be maintained over an indefinite time without causing unacceptable environmental, economic or social consequences. The problems in water supply are often of a temporal and spatial nature and arise as a consequence of population growth superimposed on the hydrologic landscape without regard to long term water yield. Such freshwater availability is intimately tied to agricultural production and food supply, disease and public health, as well as ancillary benefits of recreation, and ecosystem dynamics and health. To achieve these goals, the components of the water budget must be quantified at multiple temporal and spatial scales. In previous studies, an ecohydrological model called SWAT (Soil and Water Assessment Tool), was used to determine blue and green water sustainability on both the continental scale of Africa and the country of Iran. Blue water flow is defined as the sum of water yield and aquifer recharge, green water flow is actual evapotranspiration, and green water storage is soil moisture. In this study, we performed a more detailed application of SWAT in the Upper Mississippi River Basin and defined brown water as water that was limited for use due to high nitrate concentrations. Water sustainability was defined as the average annual blue water flow minus brown water flow per capita. A scenario of future population growth was also simulated to determine human impacts of water sustainability.