REGIONAL RAINFALL INTENSITY-DURATION-FREQUENCY CURVES FOR PENNSYLVANIA1

ABSTRACT: A statistical analysis of all available continuous hourly and 15-minute duration rainfall records for Pennsylvania was performed to develop an updated procedure to estimate design storms. As a resuit of this study, Pennsylvania was divided into five homogeneous rainfall regions and a set of rainfall intensity-duration curves developed for each region, for return periods of 1 to 100 years and durations ranging from 5 minutes to 24 hours. The PDT-IDF curves were judged to be a better representation of Pennsylvania rainfall than the nationwide TP-40 maps, particularly for storm events of 10-years and lower return periods. The average time distribution of 24-hour storms in Pennsylvania was found to be well represented by the SCS Type II distribution. The Corps of Engineers SPS 24-hour distribution was found to differ appreciably from both the SCS Type H and the Pennsylvania 24-hour storm distribution. For storm durations between 15 and 90 minutes the standard Yarnell intensity-duration curves closely resemble Pennsylvania storm distributions.     

REGIONAL MANAGEMENT OF DEPLETED AQUIFERS1

ABSTRACT: Aquifers with pressure head seriously reduced by overdrafting are referred to as depleted. In coastal areas they may be invaded by saltwater. An obvious remedy is to reduce the rate of withdrawal to the permanently available dependable yield. This is being done now in two areas for New Jersey, under the authority of the State's Water Supply Management Act; but it has not previously been accomplished on a regional scale. The dependable yield was estimated by means of detailed hydrogeological modeling. “Water Supply Critical Areas” were delimited on the basis of piezometric pressure, drawn down 30 feet below sea level. Within the depleted area, water withdrawals must be reduced by a fixed ratio (35 to 50 percent) below the amount withdrawn during 1983. This reduction is effective as soon as al alternative source of water can be made available, usually from a surface source. Special arrangements are made whereby ground water users unconnected to the alternative source of supply can pay to withdrawn their full needs from the depleted aquifers, the money being used to purchase additional water from the new surface water source, in return for which some other user will reduce his ground water withdrawal below his reduced allocation.     

Dilemmas of regional planning in Hungary

The author provides an account of Hungarian regional policy and planning during the last 40 years, describing a socialist state trying to escape from a centrally planned economy. The paper discusses the consequences of the reforms and the problems of conflict resolution which resulted. The author argues that central planning will continue to be necessary in the future, and that there is a need to strengthen the co‐ordinative role of regional plans.     

The use of computer models in planning upland land use

The British Ecological Society has suggested that computer‐based techniques could be used in the coordination of policies across different land uses in upland planning. This paper looks briefly at one such technique — a linear programming model — and describes its use at a regional scale for the Sedburgh area in north‐west England. The paper concludes with consideration of why such models are not in more common use.     

SENSITIVITY ANALYSIS OF A DRAINAGE SIMULATION MODEL1

A sensitivity analysis of a computer model, simulating major water and nitrogen processes of a soil-water-plant-climatic system on an annual basis, was conducted to determine how the model reacts to the variations in selected hydrologic and nitrogen parameters. Two major output variables (namely, total subsurface drain volume and cumulative nitrate loss with subsurface drain water) were selected for the sensitivity analysis. Model sensitivity analysis shows that the model is most sensitive to hydrologic parameters. The model is very sensitive to variations in the initial water content in the soil profile.     

Assessing Potential for Recovery of Biotic Richness and Indicator Species due to Changes in Acidic Deposition and Lake ph in Five Areas of Southeastern Canada

Biological damage to sensitive aquatic ecosystems is among the most recognisable, deleterious effects of acidic deposition. We compiled a large spatial database of over 2000 waterbodies across southeastern Canada from various federal, provincial and academic sources. Data for zooplankton, fish, macroinvertebrate (benthos) and loon species richness and occurrence were used to construct statistical models for lakes with varying pH, dissolved organic carbon content and lake size. pH changes, as described and predicted using the Integrated Assessment Model (Lam et al., 1998; Jeffries et al., 2000), were based on the range of emission reductions set forth in the Canada/US Air Quality Agreement (AQA). The scenarios tested include 1983, 1990, 1994 and 2010 sulphate deposition levels. Biotic models were developed for five regions in southeastern Canada (Algoma, Muskoka, and Sudbury, Ontario, southcentral Québec, and Kejimkujik, Nova Scotia) using regression tree, multiple linear regression and logistic regression analyses to make predictions about recovery after emission reductions. The analyses produced different indicator species in different regions, although some species showed consistent trends across regions. Generally, the greatest predicted recovery occurred during the final phase of emission reductions between 1994 and 2010 across all taxonomic groups and regions. The Ontario regions, on average, were predicted to recover to a greater extent than either southcentral Québec or the Kejimkujik area of Nova Scotia. Our results reconfirm that pH 5.5–6.0 is an important threshold below which damage to aquatic biota will remain a major local and regional environmental problem. This damage to biodiversity across trophic levels will persist well into the future if no further reductions in sulphate deposition are implemented.     

Interlaboratory variability of amphipod sediment toxicity tests in a cooperative regional monitoring program

Marine sediment toxicity tests are widely applied in monitoring programs, yet relatively little is known about the comparability of data from different laboratories. The need for comparability information is increased in cooperative monitoring programs, where multiple laboratories (often with variable skill levels) perform toxicity tests. An interlaboratory comparison exercise was conducted among seven laboratories in order to document the comparability of sediment toxicity measurements during the Bight'98 regional sediment survey in southern California. Sediments from four stations in Los Angeles and Long Beach Harbors were tested using a 10-day survival test of the amphipod Eohaustorius estuarius. All laboratories successfully performed the sediment test and associated reference toxicant test. Statistically significant differences were found in mean amphipod survival rates among some laboratories for the field-collected sediments, but there was little evidence of a consistent bias among laboratories. Although the reference toxicant test indicated a five-fold variation in test sensitivity among laboratories, these results were not accurate predictors of interlaboratory performance for the sediment tests. The laboratories demonstrated excellent concordance (Kendall's W = 0.91) in ranking the field-collected sediments by toxicity. Agreement on classifying the sediments into categories (nontoxic, moderately toxic, and highly toxic) based upon the percent of survival was best for highly toxic sediments. An analysis of test precision based upon the variance among replicates within a test indicated that the measured survival rate for a sample may vary by up to 12 percentage points from the actual response.     

JSEM: A Framework for Identifying and Evaluating Indicators

There are two issues in indicator development that have not been adequately addressed: (1) how to select an optimal combination of potentially redundant indicators that together best represent an endpoint, given cost constraints; (2) how to identify and evaluate indicators when the endpoint is unmeasured. This paper presents an approach to identifying and evaluating combinations of indicators when the mathematical relationships between the indicators and an endpoint may not be quantified, a limitation common to many ecological assessments. The approach uses the framework of Structural Equation Modeling (SEM), which combines path analysis withmeasurement models, to formalize available informationabout potential indicators and to evaluate their potential adequacy for representing an endpoint. Unlike traditional applications of SEM which require data on all variables, our approach – judgement-based SEM (JSEM) – can utilize expert judgement regarding the strengths and shapes of indicator-endpoint relationships. JSEM is applied in two stages. First, a conceptual model that relates variables in a network of direct and indirect linkages is developed, and is used to identify indicators relevant to an endpoint. Second, an index of indicator strength – i.e., the strength of the relationship between the endpoint and a set of indicators – is calculated from estimates of correlation between the modeled variables, and is used to compare alternative sets of indicators. The second stage is most appropriate for large, long-term assessments. Although JSEM is not a statistical technique, basing JSEM on SEM provides a structure for validating the conceptual model and for refining the index of indicator strength as data become available. Our main objective is to contribute to a rigorous and consistent selection of indicators even when knowledgeabout the ability of indicators to represent an endpoint is limited to expert judgement.     

Limitations of multimedia models for use in environmental decision making

The United States currently is engaged in a complex,multi-billion dollar effort to cleanup a legacy ofboth privately- and federally-owned hazardous wastesites. Decisions regarding the best approach forremediation of these sites often are based on theanalysis of potential risks to human health and theenvironment. A cornerstone of such analysis is thefrequent use of computerized multimedia environmentaltransport models, to evaluate the large quantities ofinformation necessary to understand the present andfuture implications of contamination at a site. Onebarrier to wide-spread use of this analyticalprocedure is the view that results obtained usingcomputer models are highly dependent on user input,and therefore, subject to manipulation. It is widelyrecognized that for decisions to be both credible andimplementable, the public must have confidence in boththe scientific basis for judgments involved and thedecision processes employed (NRC, 1983). Our purposein this article is to overview the difficultiesassociated with application of multimedia models toreal world problems and the contribution these modelscan make to technically sound estimates of exposure and risk.