Multiple pollutant discharge permit markets,a challenge for wastewater treatment plants

This study focuses on the challenge of using a multiple pollutant transferable discharge permit market for operating wastewater treatment plants. It uses an analytical case of Sefidrud River in Iran with two checkpoints. It shows that the operating limitations for simultaneous biochemical oxidation demand (BOD) and total nitrogen (TN) removal may convert the economically optimal waste load allocation (WLA) to a framework with lack of incentives. Therefore, water quality trading (WQT) may lose its economical advantages. In this case, a third parameter, such as dissolved oxygen is recommended as an index for assigning market interactions. In spite of economical and practical success, this approach made WLA become a more complicated and uncertain policy. It was totally concluded that using single parameter WQT is only recommended for areas with small agricultural activities or lakes. Otherwise, the integrated discharged permit and reclaimed water market is proposed instead for simultaneous BOD and TN management.     

Water Quality Model Uncertainty Analysis of a Point‐Point Source Phosphorus Trading Program1

Kardos, Josef S. and Christopher C. Obropta, 2011. Water Quality Model Uncertainty Analysis of a Point‐Point Source Phosphorus Trading Program. Journal of the American Water Resources Association (JAWRA) 47(6):1317–1337. DOI: 10.1111/j.1752‐1688.2011.00591.x Abstract: Water quality modeling is a major source of scientific uncertainty in the Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) process. The effects of these uncertainties extend to water quality trading programs designed to implement TMDLs. This study examines the effects of water quality model uncertainty on a nutrient trading program. The study builds on previous work to design a phosphorus trading program for the Nontidal Passaic River Basin in New Jersey that would implement the watershed TMDL for total phosphorus (TP). The study identified how water quality model uncertainty affects outcomes of potential trades of TP between wastewater treatment plants. The uncertainty analysis found no evidence to suggest that the outcome of trades between wastewater treatment plants, as compared with command and control regulation, will significantly increase uncertainty in the attainment of dissolved oxygen surface water quality standards, site‐specific chlorophyll a criteria, and reduction targets for diverted TP load at potential hot spots in the watershed. Each simulated trading scenario demonstrated parity with or improvement from the command and control approach at the TMDL critical locations, and low risk of hot spots elsewhere.     

ANALYSIS OF WASTE LOAD ALLOCATION PROCEDURES1

A study was made to analyze and modify procedures used for stream assimilation capacity and point source wasteload allocation calculations. This paper describes the sources and types of information collected and the analysis of alternative computation methods developed during the study. The calculation of stream assimilation capacity or Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL), will depend upon assumed stream flows, quality standards, reaction rates, and modeling procedures. The “critical conditions” selected for TMDL calculations usually are low flows and warm temperatures. The complexity of water quality models used for TMDL and allocation calculations can range from simple, complete mixing to calibrated and verified mathematical models. A list of 20 wasteload allocation (WLA) methods was developed. Five of these WLA's were applied to an example stream to permit comparisons based on cost, equity, efficient use of stream assimilation capacity, and sensitivity to fundamental stream quality data. Based on insensitivity to data errors and current use by several states, the WLA method of “equal percent treatment” was preferable in the example stream.     

Application of an Environmental Decision Support System to a Water Quality Trading Program Affected by Surface Water Diversions

Environmental decision support systems (EDSSs) are an emerging tool used to integrate the evaluation of highly complex and interrelated physicochemical, biological, hydrological, social, and economic aspects of environmental problems. An EDSS approach is developed to address hot-spot concerns for a water quality trading program intended to implement the total maximum daily load (TMDL) for phosphorus in the Non-Tidal Passaic River Basin of New Jersey. Twenty-two wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) spread throughout the watershed are considered the major sources of phosphorus loading to the river system. Periodic surface water diversions to a major reservoir from the confluence of two key tributaries alter the natural hydrology of the watershed and must be considered in the development of a trading framework that ensures protection of water quality. An EDSS is applied that enables the selection of a water quality trading framework that protects the watershed from phosphorus-induced hot spots. The EDSS employs Simon’s (1960) three stages of the decision-making process: intelligence, design, and choice. The identification of two potential hot spots and three diversion scenarios enables the delineation of three management areas for buying and selling of phosphorus credits among WWTPs. The result shows that the most conservative option entails consideration of two possible diversion scenarios, and trading between management areas is restricted accordingly. The method described here is believed to be the first application of an EDSS to a water quality trading program that explicitly accounts for surface water diversions.     

TMDL Balance: A Model for Coastal Water Pollutant Loadings

Bacterial contamination accounts for more than 60% of the impairments included on the 2008 Texas 303(d) List. Many of these bacterial impairments are along the Texas Gulf Coast because coastal waters often are regulated for oyster harvesting, which have strict water quality standards. Under the Clean Water Act, each one of these impaired waterbodies requires a total maximum daily load (TMDL) study to be performed. A recent, statewide study recommended the development and application of simple modeling approaches to address the majority of Texas's bacteria TMDLs, including “… simple load duration curve, GIS [geographic information systems], and/or mass balance models.” We developed the TMDL Balance model in response to this recommendation. TMDL Balance is a steady state, mass balance, GIS‐based model for simulating pollutant loads and concentrations in coastal systems. The model uses plug‐flow reactor and continuously‐stirred tank reactor equations to route spatially distributed point and nonpoint source loads through a watershed via overland flow, non‐tidal flow, and tidal flow, decaying the loads via first‐order kinetics. In this paper, we explain the development of the watershed loading portion of the TMDL Balance model, demonstrating the methodology through a case study: computing bacterial loads in the Copano Bay watershed of southeast Texas. The application highlights an example of distributing bacterial sources spatially based on land use data.     

Development of bacteria and benthic total maximum daily loads: a case study, Linville Creek, Virginia

Two total maximum daily load (TMDL) studies were performed for Linville Creek in Rockingham County, Virginia, to address bacterial and benthic impairments. The TMDL program is an integrated watershed management approach required by the Clean Water Act. This paper describes the procedures used by the Center for TMDL and Watershed Studies at Virginia Tech to develop the Linville Creek TMDLs and discusses the key lessons learned from and the ramifications of the procedures used in these and other similar TMDL studies. The bacterial impairment TMDL was developed using the Hydrological Simulation Program-Fortran (HSPF). Fecal coliform loads were estimated through an intensive source characterization process. The benthic impairment TMDL was developed using the Generalized Watershed Loading Function (GWLF) model and the reference watershed approach. The bacterial TMDL allocation scenario requires a 100% reduction in cattle manure direct-deposits to the stream, a 96% reduction in nonpoint-source loadings to the land surface, and a 95% reduction in wildlife direct-deposits to the stream. Sediment was identified as the primary benthic stressor. The TMDL allocation scenario for the benthic impairment requires an overall reduction of 12.3% of the existing sediment loads. Despite the many drawbacks associated with using watershed-scale models like HSPF and GWLF to develop TMDLs, the detailed watershed and pollutant-source characterization required to use these and similar models creates information that stakeholders need to select appropriate corrective measures to address the cause of the water quality impairment when implementing the TMDL.     

Using Spatially Detailed Water‐Quality Data and Solute‐Transport Modeling to Support Total Maximum Daily Load Development1

Walton‐Day, Katherine, Robert L. Runkel, and Briant A. Kimball, 2012. Using Spatially Detailed Water‐Quality Data and Solute‐Transport Modeling to Support Total Maximum Daily Load Development. Journal of the American Water Resources Association (JAWRA) 48(5): 949‐969. DOI: 10.1111/j.1752‐1688.2012.00662.x Abstract: Spatially detailed mass‐loading studies and solute‐transport modeling using OTIS (One‐dimensional Transport with Inflow and Storage) demonstrate how natural attenuation and loading from distinct and diffuse sources control stream water quality and affect load reductions predicted in total maximum daily loads (TMDLs). Mass‐loading data collected during low‐flow from Cement Creek (a low‐pH, metal‐rich stream because of natural and mining sources, and subject to TMDL requirements) were used to calibrate OTIS and showed spatially variable effects of natural attenuation (instream reactions) and loading from diffuse (groundwater) and distinct sources. OTIS simulations of the possible effects of TMDL‐recommended remediation of mine sites showed less improvement to dissolved zinc load and concentration (14% decrease) than did the TMDL (53‐63% decrease). The TMDL (1) assumed conservative transport, (2) accounted for loads removed by remediation by subtracting them from total load at the stream mouth, and (3) did not include diffuse‐source loads. In OTIS, loads were reduced near their source; the resulting concentration was decreased by natural attenuation and increased by diffuse‐source loads during downstream transport. Thus, by not including natural attenuation and loading from diffuse sources, the TMDL overestimated remediation effects at low flow. Use of the techniques presented herein could improve TMDLs by incorporating these processes during TMDL development.     

唐山排污权交易模式浅析

对开展排污权交易的目的、意义、关键因素进行了分析,对唐山排污权交易的工作进程以及交易指标、交易主体、交易程序、指导价格、申购数量、交易范围、优先及限制条件等模式特点进行了阐述,以期为同类型城市开展排污权交易提供参考。     

Linear Superposition in Total Maximum Daily Loads Applications: The Steady‐State Response Matrix Revisited1

Abstract: The steady‐state response matrix has historically proved a valuable tool in computing the water quality response to loadings and in providing insight into the relative impact of individual loading sources. The insight obtained may be is particularly useful in modern applications of increasingly complex water quality models to problems involving multiple point and nonpoint sources, such as in the assessment of total maximum daily loads (TMDLs). Where appropriate and the underlying equations linear, the steady‐state response matrix can be used to synthesize the results of more complicated models and present them in a way easily understood by policy makers. A straightforward method is presented for generating the response matrix using complex models, and example applications discussed. Example applications include a simple demonstration; incorporation of the method into the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality’s STREAM model used in TMDL development; a TMDL modeling study of the Grand Calumet River and Indiana Harbor Canal, Indiana, using CE‐QUAL‐ICM; and a TMDL modeling study of the Big Sunflower River, Mississippi, using the Water Analysis Simulation Program model.     

Transaction costs and the clean development mechanism

The emissions trading provisions of the Kyoto Protocol and its clean development mechanism (CDM) are designed to permit greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reductions at the lowest cost globally. However, to ensure climate integrity, these reductions must pass through vigilant approval, monitoring and evaluation procedures that create additional transaction costs unrelated to the physical process of eliminating GHGs. Moreover, the CDM's additionality criterion creates constraints that magnify the influence of these transaction costs on project viability. If these costs are extreme, they could undermine the success of the CDM, and possibly of the Kyoto Protocol itself. This article describes the trading provisions of the treaty, creates a working definition of transaction costs, and discusses their effects. It then analyzes the process of creating a CDM project to identify the sources of transaction costs, illustrated by an example of a fuel substitution project in Ghana. The conditions for project profitability are analyzed and compared with recent GHG emission credit prices in Europe. The specific Ghanaian results are not generalizable to all CDM projects, but the model does suggest a template that can be used to analyze the effects of project and transaction costs in other contexts.     

From ACEA's voluntary agreement to an emission trading scheme for new passenger cars

This paper critically analyses the voluntary agreement of the European Automobile Manufacturers Association (ACEA) which is intended to ensure a significant reduction of average CO₂ emissions from new passenger cars. It concludes that the voluntary agreement is far from being an adequate solution in terms of both ecological effectiveness and economic cost-efficiency. Therefore, the paper proposes to replace the voluntary agreement by an emission trading scheme which directly places car makers under obligation. This switch in policy should be accompanied by further phased increases in the ecotax levied on fuels and a vehicle taxation system that places greater focus on CO₂ emission.     

Moving up the waste hierarchy: Car boot sales,reuse exchange and the challenges of consumer culture to waste prevention

Moving up the waste hierarchy is a key priority for UK waste policy. Waste prevention requires policy interventions to promote reuse. The term ‘reuse exchange’ has been adopted by UK policy makers to describe a variety of second-hand trading outlets including car boot sales, charity shops and online exchange sites. As waste policy is based on tonnage diverted from disposal (or landfill), policy interventions to promote reuse exchange will be based on the weight of goods estimated to be flowing through these sites. This paper uses a combination of field survey data and scale-up estimation to quantify and characterise the weight of goods exchanged at car boot sales in England in 2012. This is estimated at 50–60 000 tonnes per annum. The paper emphasises that movement up the waste hierarchy brings waste policy into closer contact with household consumption practices. It draws on qualitative research to show that, for participants, car boot sales are not associated with waste prevention. Instead, car boot sales rely on stocks of surplus household goods and exemplify the culture of thrift, which enables more, not less, consumption. The paper shows the collision between the social values that inform thrift and the environmental values that underpin reuse; and it argues that the policy goal of enhanced recovery for reuse might best be achieved by working with consumer culture. Two ways of achieving this are suggested: interventions that make it easier for consumers to do the right thing, through promoting opportunities for the circulation of stocks of surplus goods, for example, through increasing the frequency of car boot sales; and interventions which recognise that car boot sales also generate waste, which could be recovered for reuse.     

Stakeholder Analysis of a Collaborative Watershed Management Process: A Florida Case Study1

Borisova, Tatiana, Laila Racevskis, and Jennison Kipp, 2012. Stakeholder Analysis of a Collaborative Watershed Management Process: A Florida Case Study. Journal of the American Water Resources Association (JAWRA) 48(2): 277‐296. DOI: 10.1111/j.1752-1688.2011.00615.x Abstract: This study focuses on a Florida watershed where development of a total maximum daily load (TMDL) and its implementation plan resulted in conflicts among stakeholders. The overall goal is to build a better understanding of stakeholder perceptions of water quality problems, water policy processes and decisions, and water management plan development in a region where these issues have become contentious. Findings are based on a stakeholder analysis using qualitative data collected through focus groups with agricultural producers, local governments, and environmental groups, and supplemented with additional qualitative data on the watershed management process. Stakeholder conflicts in this case study are associated with perceived flaws in the structural and procedural characteristics of the stakeholder involvement process: (1) suboptimal watershed stakeholder representation on the TMDL executive committee, (2) an inappropriate voting procedure for making TMDL decisions, (3) limitations in information sharing between regulatory agencies and watershed stakeholders, and (4) stakeholders’ doubts about whether tradeoffs associated with achieving the water quality targets were assessed adequately throughout the TMDL planning and implementation process. This study contributes to the literature on collaborative watershed management by analyzing stakeholder involvement given Florida’s unique institutional settings, where implementation of TMDL pollution abatement is mandatory.     

An Ex Post Evaluation of Ohio’s Great Miami Water Quality Trading Program1

Newburn, David A. and Richard T. Woodward, 2011. An Ex Post Evaluation of Ohio’s Great Miami Water Quality Trading Program. Journal of the American Water Resources Association (JAWRA) 48(1): 156‐169. DOI: 10.1111/j.1752‐1688.2011.00601.x Abstract: Market‐based approaches to address water quality problems have resulted in only limited success, especially in trading programs involving both point and nonpoint sources. We analyze one of the largest point‐nonpoint trading programs – the Great Miami Trading Program in Ohio, administered by the Miami Conservancy District (MCD). Our evaluation focuses on the economic and institutional aspects of the program, including cost effectiveness, efficiency of bidding, transaction costs, trading ratios, and innovation. We use a unique dataset consisting of all bids from agricultural nonpoint sources and interviews of soil and water conservation district (SWCD) agents in the watershed. We find that the MCD’s reliance on county‐level SWCD offices to recruit and advise farmers has been essential to achieve relatively high rates of farmer participation. Additionally, the MCD is able to partly free ride on the administrative costs that SWCD offices receive to assist federal conservation programs, which is helpful to lower costs for a fledgling trading program. However, the involvement of SWCD offices reduced the potential cost savings from the reverse auction structure because some agents were able to learn about the threshold price over the six rounds of bidding and help farmers bid strategically. Overall, the program structure serves as an effective model for future trading programs in other regions that seek to involve agricultural nonpoint sources.     

碳排放交易体系的政策灵活性:国际经验及启示

在《联合国气候变化框架公约》和《京都议定书》的背景下,越来越多的国家开始关注全球气候变暖的问题。考虑到碳排放交易体系比碳税更具有政治可行性,不少国家或地区开始实施碳排放交易体系,以最低的减排成本来达到温室气体减排目标。然而,采用碳排放交易体系,其排放总量是固定的,而减排成本是不确定的,可能会出现由于政策或外部冲击而产生的配额价格异常波动的现象。因此,为确保碳排放交易体系的成本有效性,政策灵活性十分重要。在理想情况下,碳排放市场具有完全的时间灵活性(包括长期的履约期、自由的配额储存与预借)和空间灵活性(即建立全球碳市场),这将对增强市场流动性、降低减排成本、缓解价格波动起到重要的作用。然而,由于政策设计需要考虑更多因素,实际上理想状态很难达到。本文将对国外碳排放交易体系的政策灵活性设计进行较为系统的分析和比较,尤其关注履约期的长短、配额的跨期使用、配额的抵消、区域碳市场连接等方面的具体政策设计,这对我国在7个省市进行碳排放交易试点以及今后建立全国性的碳排放交易体系有较强的借鉴意义。     

Tradable planning permits versus auctioned tradable development rights: different trading agents,different policy outcomes

The tradable planning permit (TPP) policy seeks to limit the land take by development. It can be used in countries where development rights are vested by land-use planning to certain landowners only. TPPs are traded among public authorities. We introduce here a new policy, called the auctioned tradable development rights (ATDR) policy, which takes advantage of unvested rights of development and of trading among private actors. We compare the TPP, the ATDR policy and our baseline land-use planning model using a set of criteria. There are trade-offs within compared models. Both trading policies extend opportunities for land protection from development in exchange for higher transaction costs (highest in the ATDR policy). Trading policies seek also to recapture a part of development rent, decrease rent-seeking, and locate new development more effectively from the investors' perspective. However, trading among public authorities in the TPP model may hinder attaining these effects.     

POINT‐NONPOINT SOURCE WATER QUALITY TRADING: A CASE STUDY IN THE MINNESOTA RIVER BASIN1

ABSTRACT: Contrary to the general trend of only a few actual trades occurring within point‐nonpoint source water quality trading programs in the United States, two trading projects in the Minnesota River Basin, created under the provisions of National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits, have generated five major trades and numerous smaller ones. In this paper, these two projects are described to illustrate their origins, implementation, and results. It was found that several factors contributed to the relatively high number of trades in these projects, including the offsetting nature of the projects (hence a fixed number of credits that the point sources were required to obtain), readily available information on potential nonpoint source trading partners, and an effectively internal trading scheme used by one of the two projects. It was also found that long term structural pollution control measures, such as streambank stabilization, offered substantial cost savings over point source controls. Estimates of transaction costs showed that the total costs of the trading projects were increased by at least 35 percent after transaction costs were taken into account. Evidence also showed that in addition to pollution reduction, these two trading projects brought other benefits to the watershed, such as helping balance environmental protection and regional economic growth.     

Transitions of municipal solid waste management. Part I: Scenarios of Swiss waste glass-packaging disposal

All municipal solid waste (MSW) management systems—even “high quality systems” or those employing “best practices”—face multiple challenges, e.g., decreasing prices of secondary raw materials recovered by municipalities, increasing complexity of waste composition, technological lock-ins. Policy-making involves translating these challenges into goals that are generic in nature and implementing them on MSW fractions thanks to tailor-made policy tools, e.g., anticipated disposal fees. Anticipating the impacts of policies can provide valuable insights into the adequacy of policy tools with respect to economic, political, and social contexts of MSW. The goal of this paper is to construct consistent, future scenarios of Swiss waste glass-packaging disposal based on literature and stakeholder knowledge, including the allocation of waste to different disposal routes. These scenarios are future states to which the current system could transit to due to alternative policies in line with waste policy goals and varying societal constraints (e.g., commodity prices). Results of scenario construction show that policy has a limited effect on waste glass-packaging disposal because of economic constraints, preventing goals from consistently being achieved. For instance, increases in energy prices can impede a policy favoring recycling over downcycling to foam glass, an energy-saving product. The procedure applied to construct possible scenarios suits well the ambition of considering uncertain future developments affecting MSW management as it integrates qualitative and quantitative knowledge of various sources and disciplines.     

A Nationally Consistent NHDPlus Framework for Identifying Interstate Waters: Implications for Integrated Assessments and Interjurisdictional TMDLs

The US Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDL) program promotes nationally consistent approaches for documenting the progress in restoring impaired waters. EPA’s TMDL program provides tracking systems comprising both database and geographic information systems (GIS) mapping components. The GIS mapping is implemented using the National Hydrography Dataset (NHD). The EPA and the US Geological Survey have developed an enhanced NHD product (NHDPlus) that is applied in this study to define an interstate waters framework for the conterminous United States. This NHDPlus-based framework provides an efficient watershed-oriented approach for selecting interstate waters. Greater consistency in approaches for interstate waters is essential for providing improved techniques for integrated assessment and management programs. Improved analysis tools for interstate waters are clearly important from a federal perspective. Insights based on tools for federal interstate waters are also of interest for state water quality agencies when they deal with complicated interjurisdictional challenges that can require leveraging support from a wide range of stakeholders. Summaries are provided on the degree of consistency documented for inland waters where states have provided TMDL listing GIS information for shared interstate NHD reaches, and summaries are provided on the patterns for interstate assessments organized according to the ecoregions developed for EPA’s Wadeable Streams Assessment. The relevance of this interstate waters framework in leveraging the TMDL program to provide enhanced support for watershed oriented management approaches is also explored.     

GROUPWISE MODELING STUDY OF BACTERIALLY IMPAIRED WATERSHEDS IN TEXAS: CLUSTERING ANALYSIS1

ABSTRACT: Under the Clean Water Act (CWA) program, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) listed 110 stream segments in the year 2000 with pathogenic bacteria impairment. A study was conducted to evaluate the probable sources of pollution and characterize the watersheds associated with these impaired water bodies. The primary aim of the study was to group the water bodies into clusters having similar watershed characteristics and to examine the possibility of studying them as a group by choosing models for total maximum daily load (TMDL) development based on their characteristics. This approach will help to identify possible sources and determine appropriate models and hence reduce the number of required TMDL studies. This in turn will help in reducing the effort required to restore the health of the impaired water bodies in Texas. The main characteristics considered for the classification of water bodies were land use distribution within the watershed, density of stream network, average distance of land of a particular use to the closest stream, household population, density of on‐site sewage facilities (OSSFs), bacterial loading from different types of farm animals and wildlife, and average climatic conditions. The climatic data and observed instream fecal coliform bacteria concentrations were analyzed to evaluate seasonal variability of instream water quality. The grouping of water bodies was carried out using the multivariate statistical techniques of factor analysis/principal component analysis, cluster analysis, and discriminant analysis. The multivariate statistical analysis resulted in six clusters of water bodies. The main factors that differentiated the clusters were found to be bacterial contribution from farm animals and wildlife, density of OSSFs, density of households connected to public sewers, and land use distribution.