The limitation of urban water supplies is becoming worse each year. Several studies estimate that 2 billion of the world’s population will suffer from water scarcity by 2050; and urbanization rates is placing an even greater challenge in providing the infrastructure needed to serve growing populations. At this point, rainwater may be considered as the most critical, untapped water resource in a global aspect. Rainwater Harvesting Systems (RWHS) have tremendous potential, not only to provide sufficient water supply, but also to serve as a valuable stormwater management tool. Despite these benefits, RWHS is still not popular among ordinary people in urban situations, due mostly to high installation costs. This study aims to explore the equitable cost reallocation of residential rainwater harvesting systems between the urban utility, land developer and homebuilder, and individual homeowner sectors. It may be possible to redistribute the cost equitably among the parties based on potential benefits received,thereby making RWHS more affordable and more viable as a new water supply for urban areas. / text

Afro-descendant communities in Central America have recently made important legal strides by enshrining their right to equal treatment under the law and in some cases their ability to claim a distinct group status in national constitutions. The United Nations recently issued a draft resolution declaring that access to water and sanitation is a universal right, furthering the tools available to marginalized afro-descendant peoples in their battles against poverty and underdevelopment. Unfortunately, implementation of these measures has been slow in some areas and non-existent in others. Though there have been some advances, the situation for Afro-descendant communities remains largely unchanged and the availability of the basic requirements of life for Afro-descendant populations remains among the lowest in the region. Increased attention to the political, social, and especially the material situation of Afro-descendant communities is needed in political circles, as well as in the academic community. There is a lack of scholarly work on the material well-being of Afro-descendent populations in Central America. An important initial contribution in this area would be the compilation, and accumulation of statistical information as a primary step in developing the literature. The focus of this study then is on the Atlantic Coast Afro-descendant populations in Nicaragua. This document will outline the current material circumstances of Nicaraguan Afro-descendant communities using data gathered from a variety of sources, identify the causes of inadequate access to water and sanitation, and suggest strategies to improve the situation of these communities. It is my sincere hope that, at the very least, increased attention will be brought to the situation. / text

published_or_final_version / Public Administration / Master / Master of Public Administration

published_or_final_version / Public Administration / Master / Master of Public Administration

The potential to supplement the potable water supply with highly treated municipal wastewater, or sewage, is of increasing interest to water managers and planners in many parts of the world. Seen as an option of last resort as recently as the late 1990s, today engineers commonly consider potable water reuse projects to be as safe as, if not safer than, conventionally sourced drinking water supplies. Nevertheless, only a few cities across the world intentionally augment drinking water supplies with highly treated wastewater. The objective of my dissertation is to examine the governance of potable recycled water planning to better understand how potable recycling projects emerge as a water management strategy. Political aspects of planned potable reuse are often recognized, and even lamented by water planners and industry experts. However, there is a paucity of research that empirically analyzes the political aspects that influence public decisions on potable water projects. This study asks: how are potable water projects made, shaped, and frustrated? To examine the governance arrangements of this emerging water management strategy this research project considers three critical issues: (1) public values and social pressure, (2) the political, legal, and institutional contexts, and (3) the role of subjectivity in defining facts, themes, and solutions. As part of this study I use Q Methodology to explore shared attitudes regarding the principles that should govern the future of planned potable reuse. The overall analyses support the notion that there is more than one way to understand and approach potable water recycling, and that socially-held viewpoints are informed by social-spatial practices. The results reveal two distinct "common sense" shared ways of thinking that pivot on ideas about the appropriate technology and reflect contested visions of ideal society. My dissertation is the first to apply Q Methodology to water recycling in the United States, and I use it to examine the subjective preferences of people who participate in water recycling operations or planning. Results indicate that there are at least two commonly held viewpoints concerning the future of planned potable water recycling, which I have labeled "neosanitarian" and "ecosanitarian." Drawing upon tenets established in the Progressive Era, neosanitarians strongly believe that potable water recycling is a safe, feasible, and appropriate way to expand urban water supplies. Drawing upon tenets established in ecology, ecosanitarians are not opposed to potable water recycling, however they are also interested in radical alternatives to the sanitary status quo. Both neosanitarians and ecosanitarians want to see a more sustainable approach to water planning, yet they disagree on what a more sustainable approach actually looks like in practice. For example, neosanitarians favor microfiltration and advanced wastewater treatment, while ecosanitarians prefer composting toilets and preventative actions. Both neosanitarians and ecosanitarians accept potable reuse as a workable solution, yet there are deep divisions between the two regarding the appropriate scale of technology, the proper level of public participation, and the root cause of water scarcity. While there is wide-spread agreement on certain ends (e.g., sustainability, potable reuse), there is serious disagreement about the appropriate the means to getting there (e.g., appropriate technology, level of public participation). The results illustrate how different "ways of seeing the world" contribute to the technological choices that define appropriate behavior, which, in turn, produces different kinds of communities and environments, and conditions the range of political possibilities.

Ground-water pumping has led to subsidence and many earth fissures in unconsolidated alluvial basins in Arizona. Earth fissures result from tensile failure; however, mechanisms producing the tensile forces are not well understood. Horizontal displacement measurements (opening and closing) of seven earth fissures were made semi-monthly during 1976 to 1982 in the lower Santa Cruz Basin and Avra Valley. Permanent and temporary short-base extensometers with a resolution of ±2.54 μm were developed and perfected which use dial gauges and transducers. Among different fissure movements, the greatest total was 41.44 mm, the greatest single opening was 31 mm, and exclusive of that, the greatest net opening was 16.54 mm. Fissures opened and closed repeatedly, exhibiting smooth movements over long periods of time, punctuated by sudden jumps. Generally, old and new earth fissures exhibited similar behavior. Earth fissures tend to close after long, dry periods and to open after heavy rainfalls. The earth fissure with the greatest movement was closest to the area of the greatest subsidence.

No description available.

Cover states: Final Report submitted to the National Science Foundation / Grant No. ATM 79-24365 / Foreword states that this item is "in reality, a progress rather than a final report."

Project Completion Report, OWRT Project No. A-086-ARIZ / Agreement No. 14-34-0001-8003, Project Dates: 10/01/77-9/30/78 / Acknowledgement: The work upon which this report is based was supported by funds provided by the State of Arizona and the United States Department of Interior, Office of Water Research and Technology as authorized under the Water Resources Act of 1964. / From the Introduction: "The research work under this contract has been conducted by graduate student David B. Dunbar and summarized in his M.S. thesis entitled "Analysis of a Parameter Estimation Technique for Linear Hydrologic Systems Using Monte Carlo Simulation" submitted to the Department of Hydrology and Water Resources, University of Arizona, Tucson, in 1981. The present report is a brief summary of Mr. Dunbar's thesis." David Dunbar's thesis is available at: http://arizona.openrepository.com/arizona/handle/10150/191728 / The primary accomplishment of this research has been demonstrating the power of the deconvolution technique developed by Neuman and de Marsily (1976) in dealing with noisy rainfall- runoff records of short duration. Such records are encountered in arid environments where rainfall often occurs in short isolated bursts and the data are measured with a considerable margin of error. Our research work consisted of superimposing known noise on synthetic rainfall- runoff data and examining the ability of the Neuman -de Marsily deconvolution method to estimate the correct impulse response of the system when the data include only a single storm event. Approximately 50 Monte Carlo simulation runs were performed for each of three different noise models considered in our work. The results clearly demonstrated that the deconvolution model leads to reliable estimates and can be used with confidence in the presence of realistic noise levels. In addition to the Monte Carlo simulation tests and their analysis, certain improvements were introduced into the original deconvolution technique. In particular, the original version of the technique required that the hydrologist exercise subjective judgement in choosing the "best" solution for the deconvolution problem from a large number of admissible solutions. Our new method of selecting the "best" result is based on a comparative analysis of residuals and is more reliable than the earlier subjective approach. The improved method has been applied to real as well as synthetic rainfall -runoff data.

Research Project Technical Completion Report / Office of Water Research and Technology Project A-031-ARIZ / Annual Allotment Agreement No. 14-31-0001-5003 / FCST Research Category VII-C; OWRT Problem Area: 10 / Project Duration June 1971 to June 1975 / No publication date on item; publication date from catalog. / The Arizona Water Information System (AWIS) was developed for storage and retrieval of water resources data and for dissemination of water resources information pertaining to the State of Arizona. Collectively, the AWIS system contains a number of distinct elements. The Activity File is a listing of water resource activities and projects dating from 1961, which can be accessed by keywords or by agency to retrieve abstracts and information on approximately 1,000 projects; the file recently was updated and additional projects covered in a regional program pertaining to the Lower Colorado River Basin portions of Arizona, California, and Nevada. A bimonthly Arizona Water Resources News Bulletin and a companion Project Information Bulletin were initiated under this project and will be continued as a cooperative effort of the Arizona Water Commission and the University of Arizona Water Resources Research Center and Office of Arid Lands Studies. A cassette-tape pilot series on Arizona water trends also was produced and evaluated for use potential, which appears favorable. A western state conference on water information dissemination, sponsored by this project and OWRT, was held in Phoenix in 1973, to discuss the above kinds of activities in the several states and the possibilities for cooperative regional activities. The capability for interactive hydrologic data processing, utilizing the DEC -10 computer system at the University of Arizona, was developed in 1974 with the support of the Arizona Water Commission (AWC). Ground-water and quality-of-water data furnished by AWC have been stored progressively in the system, and are retrievable by remote terminal through telephone hookup, by quarter- township grid location or by drainage basin. Routine inquiries can be answered rapidly, or more complex retrievals can be made as desired.