Four Talks Given in China on Water Environment Protection and Restoration

In late October, I gave two lectures in Shanghai, one theme talk at the Cross Strait Water Resources Conference in Wuhan, and one lecture in the Water Resources Department of Guangdong Province. I reviewed U.S. experiences on water environment assessment, protection, and restoration. I also suggested the need to take further advantage of native microbs in the water environment restoration.

Photo to the left shows Shanghai on east and west sides of the Huangpu River. Rest of the photos that I took can be found in my water photo album.

Blue-Green Alage Bloom again in Dianchi Lake and new Daring Use of Water Hyacinth

I went to observe restoration efforts for Dianchi Lake in Kunming City, Yunnan Province while in China in July after giving water-environment lectures in GuangDong Province. The blue-green algae bloomed again, an every-year occurrence since 80's. I was told the lake water quality started to turn bad since the city was expanded and the raw sewage was collected and channeled into the lake. Much effort has been put into restoring the lake water quality with some success. The latest effort was to introduce water hyacinth into the lake (and its tributaries) to uptake nutrients from the water. Although water hyacinth is efficient in uptaking phosphorus and nitrogen from water, it can quickly grow out of control jamming the entire water surface. It was thus cultivated in the fenced-off areas and planned to be harvested (and beneficially-used) in a timely fashion. Lets hope for the best.

Photo to the left shows that entire water surface was covered by blue-green algae with the presence of introduced water hyacinth.

Rest of the photos that I took can be found in my algae bloom photo album and my water hyacinth photo album.

Water Environment Lectures in GuangDong, China

I was invited to give lectures at Sun Yat-Sun University and South China Institute of Environmental Sciences (one of the three research institutes under Ministry of Environmental Protection), both located in GuangZhou, China on July 11 and 12, respectively. The lecture was titled "Water Environment Assessment, Protection, and Restoration."

Photo to the left shows a restored urban stream in GuangZhou, Capital of GuangDong Province, that used to be a covered sewage channel. Photos of other locations that I visited in GuangDong can be found in my water photo album.

Beautiful Fall on Raritan River (near my office)

New Green Building at Yale

Kroon Hall is the new home for the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies. It is a truly sustainable building: a showcase of the latest developments in green building technology. The most interesting part to me is the rainwater harvesting system and cleansing pond outside the building (photo to the left).

The Sustainable/Climate Neutral features include:

•Demolition and construction waste was recycled
•Geothermal benefit from the underground placement of the north side of the lowest level
•Solar heat gain in winter and natural lighting year round along the long unobstructed south-facing wall
•Rooftop solar panels facing south
•Solar hot water heaters
•Geothermal energy system
•Natural light and ventilation
•Natural light is augmented with artificial light to maintain a constant lighting level; the latter is also controlled by sensors that shut off automatically if no one is present
•Manually operable windows utilize natural air circulation
•Green construction materials including “thermally inactive” concrete and low-E glass and insulation, waterless urinals and low-impact paint
•Recycled, recyclable, sustainably harvested or manufactured nontoxic materials
•Sustainably harvested wood
•Exterior stone quarried within 500 miles of campus
•Rainwater harvesting system and cleansing pond

The pond pictured above is an integral portion of a rain water re-use system which is part of the Kroon Hall project. The system collects runoff from the building's roof and from portions of the grounds. Once collected, the water is held in a settling tank which allows the majority of the sediment to settle out. From there, the water is moved to a storage tank, combined with any excess water from the geothermal wells, and slowly recirculated through the surface treatment pond (shown above). The pond employs aquatic plants to further cleanse the water, while also providing an enjoyable and relaxing area for the whole community. Finally, after the water is filtered and disenfected, it can be used for toilet flushing in the building, and for landscape irrigation.

My album contains additional photos on exterior as well as interior of the building.

Info credit: Yale University website

ANNOUNCEMENT: Henry Hudson New Generation Water Competition

Henry Hudson 400 Foundation invites undergraduates, including 2009 graduates, in marine and environmental studies, engineering, oceanography, urban design and planning, policy planning, public health, and any other related major to submit proposals on the topic Sustainability for Coastal Cities. See below for details.

• Topic: Sustainability for Coastal Cities
• Instructions: Submit a one-page description of an innovative solution to the challenges of Sustainability for Coastal Cities.
• For more information and application: http://www.henryhudson400.com/hh400_project.php?id=32
• Deadline May 29, 2009

Winners receive
• Cash prizes
• Internships at major companies
• All expenses paid invitation to international H209 Forum on September 9-10 at Liberty Science Center.
• Awards presented by Prince of Orange of The Netherlands, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., members of Obama’s environmental team, and top NY/NJ officials.

New Generation Competition is the centerpiece of the H209 Forum for business leaders, policy and decision makers, and environmental and planning experts. H209 Forum celebrates the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson’s pioneering voyage that led to the settlement of what is now New York City. For more information, visit www.henryhudson400.com

I was asked by the organizer to help publicize the competition.

Photo: New York Harbor near Jersey City, New Jersey, from Wikimedia Commons.

Sustainable Path (Soft Path) to Water Future

I attended a seminar given by Dr. Peter Gleick of the Pacific Institute earlier today at Rutgers University. Dr. Gleick offered six soft paths to the water future. I took quick notes of the six paths as follow:

1) Invest in decentralized infrastructure
2) Match water quality requirements with water designated uses
3) Do not take the demand for granted (i.e., Do more with less water)
4) Expand definition of water supply
5) Price water properly
6) Expand concepts of regulation and institutions

I was a part of the team that organized the seminar.

A Very High Sewer Fee?

I recently received a sewer bill from my township and my household was charged an annual fee of approximately one thousand dollars! Could it be called the "money down the drain?"

Township of Montgomery, New Jersey has just instituted a new usage-based sewer fee schedule. I applaud the township's change that would provide fairness as well as encourage water conservation.

But the expensive part of the sewer service also caught my attention. It was about twice the water fee! That is, it costs about twice as much to get rid of the wastewater as to receive the potable water.

The sewer fee is being calculated by the township as follows:

Base Fee = $200 per unit

Usage Fee = $6.88 per ccf* of water used

* 1 ccf per year = 100 cubic feet of water per year = 2.05 gallons per day

For example, if 50 gallons of water is used per person per day (in winter and spring seasons), the annual sewer fee for a household of 4 would be 871 dollars.

Mayor Louis Wilson, quoted in an article published in the February 10, 2009 edition of Montgomery News, provided two explanations for why the sewer fee is so high in the township:

(1) The township owns and operates eight small sewage treatment plants, and thus there is no economy of scale that we could get by being part of a regional sewer system.

(2) Our plants discharge into local streams and brooks rather than into a larger river, and thus they must meet a very high water quality standard for the (treatment plant) effluent.

The Mayor's explanations are reasonable.

The township population was only 23,023 based on the 2007 census estimate. That is, each treatment plant, in average, is serving a community of less than 3,000 people. Average capacity of the treatment plants is probably only about 0.2 million gallons per day (MGD), while capacity of a regional treatment plant would be from tens to hundreds MGD. According to a State of Wisconsin survey, the sewer fee for small communities (population less than 2,000) is approximately twice that for large communities (population greater than 50,000).

With an average household of $840, the sewer fee charged by Montgomery Township is actually not very high in comparison to other small communities in the US.

Nevertheless, I need to start checking how my family could consume less water. Although consuming less water would be good for the environment, I do not expect a significant sewer fee reduction since the township would need to operate and maintain the same infrastructure, and replacing the existing infrastructure would be costly.

It would also be interesting to find out how the township could reduce the treatment cost, if possible at all. To reduce the treatment cost, control of specific pollutant sources as well as use of innovative technologies could be explored. But cost of the treatment itself, e.g., chemicals, is typically a small fraction of the total O&M cost.

Credit: The image above of "Pike Brook (Sewage) Treatment Plant" was located and cropped from Virtual Earth.

My album contains additional photos of the Pike Brook Sewage Treatment Plant and its effluent receiving water.

Blue-Green Algae Bloom in Dianchi Lake, The Sixth Largest Freshwater Lake in China (除滇池蓝藻, 要优先降磷)

A massive algae bloom has spread out over another of China’s big lakes.

"The bloom comes after algae choked Taihu and Chaohu lakes, China’s third and fifth largest freshwater lakes respectively, in late May and early June, underscoring the state of China’s degraded water system. More than 70 percent of China’s waterways and 90 percent of its underground water are contaminated by pollution, according to the State Environmental Protection Administration" (from Gulf Times).

"The clean-up measures to date have failed to stem the pollution because they have focussed almost exclusively on (industrial) point sources around the lake periphery. They have not addressed agricultural runoff or pollution of the lake tributaries. According to a recent press report, 80 percent of domestic sewage entering the 16 rivers that flow into the Dianchi is untreated. Meanwhile, heavy use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides on farm fields lying east of the lake leads to extremely high runoff of nitrates and phosphates" (from US Embassy-Beijing Report).

My proposed engineering solution: Reduce the phosphorus input first if not enough money to reduce both phosphorus and nitrogen inputs to a very low level. The scientific justification is that the blue-green algae is prevalent in the low nitrogen-phosphorus ratio environment. Therefore, the priority now should be placed on controlling phosphorus-rich sources such as the domestic sewage.

Photo Credit: Dongfang (East) IC