TY - JOUR
T1 - Developing and validating a decision support tool for media selection to mitigate drainage waters
AU - Ezzati, G.
AU - Healy, M. G.
AU - Christianson, L.
AU - Feyereisen, G. W.
AU - Thornton, S.
AU - Daly, K.
AU - Fenton, O.
N1 - Funding Information:
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No 675120.
Funding Information:
This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sk?odowska-Curie grant agreement No 675120.
Funding Information:
The DST recommended woodchips, coco-peat, vetiver grass together with sand and zeolite, barley straw with native soil, as the highest ranked media from best to worst. This result supports the common use of denitrifying woodchip bioreactors in the USA as a well-established NO 3 remediation technology ( Christianson et al., 2012a ). The installation of woodchip bioreactors at the end of tile drainage systems is also financially supported by the US Department of Agriculture Natural Resources Conservation Service (USDA NRCS) ( NRCS, NHCP, 2015 ). Such schemes, along with the major local productions, industry needs and wholesale suppliers/distributors/importers, have a direct influence on media availability and cost and, consequently, the scoring and final selection. The output of the FarMit DST considers only selection of a medium/media. Future research is required to test the medium/media under controlled laboratory conditions to elucidate design and operational parameters.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019
PY - 2019/8
Y1 - 2019/8
N2 - The nitrate nitrogen (NO3-N) and ammonium (NH4-N) and/or dissolved reactive phosphorus (DRP) load in drainage water from farms can be managed by reactive or biological media filters. The nutrient content of the drainage water can be obtained directly from water analysis, which immediately focuses attention on filter media selection. There are many factors that may be important before choosing a medium or media e.g. nutrient removal capacity, lifetime, hydraulic conductivity, the potential for “pollution swapping”, attenuation of non-target contaminants (e.g. pesticides, organic carbon, etc.), and local availability and transportation cost of media to site. In this study, a novel decision support tool (DST) was developed, which brought all these factors together in one place for five nutrient scenarios. A systematic literature review was conducted to create a database containing 75 media with an associated static scoring system across seven criteria (% of nutrient concentration reduction, removal of other pollutants, lifetime, hydraulic conductivity, negative externalities) and a dynamic scoring system across two criteria (delivery cost and availability). The DST was tested using case studies from Ireland, Belgium and USA with different agricultural practices and nutrient scenarios. It was then validated by SWOT (strength, weakness, opportunities and threats) analysis. The DST provided a rapid, easily modifiable screening of many media-based treatments for specific dual or single nutrient-based water drainage problems. This provides stakeholders (farmers/regulators/advisors) with a versatile, flexible and robust yet easy-to-understand framework to make informed choices on appropriate media-based mitigation measures according to users’ relevant technical, economic and logistical factors.
AB - The nitrate nitrogen (NO3-N) and ammonium (NH4-N) and/or dissolved reactive phosphorus (DRP) load in drainage water from farms can be managed by reactive or biological media filters. The nutrient content of the drainage water can be obtained directly from water analysis, which immediately focuses attention on filter media selection. There are many factors that may be important before choosing a medium or media e.g. nutrient removal capacity, lifetime, hydraulic conductivity, the potential for “pollution swapping”, attenuation of non-target contaminants (e.g. pesticides, organic carbon, etc.), and local availability and transportation cost of media to site. In this study, a novel decision support tool (DST) was developed, which brought all these factors together in one place for five nutrient scenarios. A systematic literature review was conducted to create a database containing 75 media with an associated static scoring system across seven criteria (% of nutrient concentration reduction, removal of other pollutants, lifetime, hydraulic conductivity, negative externalities) and a dynamic scoring system across two criteria (delivery cost and availability). The DST was tested using case studies from Ireland, Belgium and USA with different agricultural practices and nutrient scenarios. It was then validated by SWOT (strength, weakness, opportunities and threats) analysis. The DST provided a rapid, easily modifiable screening of many media-based treatments for specific dual or single nutrient-based water drainage problems. This provides stakeholders (farmers/regulators/advisors) with a versatile, flexible and robust yet easy-to-understand framework to make informed choices on appropriate media-based mitigation measures according to users’ relevant technical, economic and logistical factors.
KW - Agriculture
KW - Drainage water
KW - Farm pollution
KW - Nitrogen
KW - Phosphorus
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U2 - 10.1016/j.ecoena.2019.100010
DO - 10.1016/j.ecoena.2019.100010
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85069946169
SN - 2590-2903
VL - 2
JO - Ecological Engineering: X
JF - Ecological Engineering: X
M1 - 100010
ER -