Rainwater management in urban areas | |
| | The risk of flooding is increasing in many cities due to the increase of water - impermeable surfaces such as buildings, asphalt and concrete. Annual floods of three German rivers: the Rhine, the Mosel and the Main, show that high priority should be placed on decentralized measures of rainwater retention. Land use practices that reduce the retention, infiltration, and evaporation of rainwater throughout a watershed are a main cause of the floods which periodically damage settlements and infrastructure built along rivers. | |
Groundwater flow and toxic waste | |
| | Understanding where the water removed from Wells G & H originated became an important issue during the toxic waste trial in Woburn, Massachusetts during the early 1980s. A detailed case has been prepared by the Computational Science Across the Curriculum group at Capital University in Bexley, Ohio. | Capital University in Bexley, Ohio:
Materials on the court case: |
Snow, rain, and river floods | |
| | Snowmelt is the main cause for floods of rivers such as the Red River that flows from the northern US to Canada. A model of the storage and flow of water in the ground can explain and predict such floods. L. Li and S. P. Simonovic: Flooding_SD_Model.pdf. Hydrol. Process. 16, 2645–2666 (2002). S. P. Simonovic and L. Li: Flood_Protection.pdf. Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management, Vol. 129, No. 5, September 1, 2003. | |
Management of artificial lakes for hydroelectric power plants | |
| | Create dynamical models to better understand the sizing of artificial lakes used for power plants and the management of water resources in these lakes. The models may be used to answer questions such as: (1) Given an area where water is collected, is there an optimum size of the artificial lake in view of the amount of water available for the power plant during a year? (2) Does it matter if rainfall is more or less evenly distributed over a year or if rainfall is strongly concentrated in a few large events every year? (3) Does it matter wether or not water from the lake is used at a steady rate for the power plant? (4) Do height of the lake above the power plant and cross section versus height of the dam play a role in regard to the above questions? | |
