Search results for "hydrology"
showing 10 items of 1041 documents
Regional flow duration curves for ungauged sites in Sicily
2011
Abstract. Flow duration curves are simple and powerful tools to deal with many hydrological and environmental problems related to water quality assessment, water-use assessment and water allocation. Unfortunately the scarcity of streamflow data enables the use of these instruments only for gauged basins. A regional model is developed here for estimating flow duration curves at ungauged basins in Sicily, Italy. Due to the complex ephemeral behaviour of the examined region, this study distinguishes dry periods, when flows are zero, from wet periods using a three parameters power law to describe the frequency distribution of flows. A large dataset of streamflows has been analysed and the param…
The Effect of Hydrology on Soil Erosion
2020
In this Special Issue, we have tried to include manuscripts about soil erosion and degradation processes and the accelerated rates due to hydrological processes and climate change. We considered that the main goal was successfully reached. The new research focused on measurements, modelling, and experiments under field or laboratory conditions developed at different scales (pedon, hillslope, and catchment) were submitted and published. This Special Issue received investigations from different parts of the world such as Ethiopia, Morocco, China, Iran, Italy, Portugal, Greece and Spain, among others. We are happy to see that all papers presented findings characterized as unconventional, provo…
Time Scale Effects and Interactions of Rainfall Erosivity and Cover Management Factors on Vineyard Soil Loss Erosion in the Semi-Arid Area of Souther…
2019
Several authors describe the effectiveness of cover crop management practice as an important tool to prevent soil erosion, but at the same time, they stress on the high soil loss variability due to the interaction of several factors characterized by large uncertainty. In this paper the Revised Universal Soil Loss Equation (RUSLE) model is applied to two Sicilian vineyards that are characterized by different topographic factors
Long-term changes in the water temperature of rivers in Latvia
2016
Abstract The study describes the trends of monthly mean water temperature (from May to October) and the annual maximum water temperature of the rivers in Latvia during the time period from 1945 to 2000. The results demonstrated that the mean water temperatures during the monitoring period from May to October were higher in the largest rivers (from 13.6 °C to 16.1 °C) compared to those in the smallest rivers (from 11.5 °C to 15.7 °C). Similar patterns were seen for the maximum water temperature: in large rivers from 22.9 °C to 25.7 °C, and in small rivers from 20.8 °C to 25.8 °C. Generally, lower water temperatures occurred in rivers with a high groundwater inflow rate, for example, in river…
Comparing long term sediment records to current biological quality element data – Implications for bioassessment and management of a eutrophic lake
2012
Defining reference conditions for lakes situated in areas of human settlement and agriculture is rarely straightforward, and is especially difficult within easily eroding and nutrient rich watersheds. We used diatoms, cyanobaterial akinetes, remains of green algae and chironomid head capsules from sediment samples of Lake Kirmanjarvi, Finland, to assess its deviation from the initial ecological status. These site-specific records of change were compared to current type-specific ecological status assessment. All paleolimnological data indicated deviation from natural conditions and mirrored the current, monitoring-based assessment of “moderate” ecological lake status. However, the sediment d…
Influencia de la litología en los procesos de erosión en <i>badlands</i>. Los casos de Anna (Valencia) y Petrer (Alicante)
1997
By means of experiments with simulated rainfall the hydrological and erosional behaviour of degraded surfaces (badlands) developed on two different parent materials (marls and clays) is studied. On the Keuper clays, the ponding (4'07") and runoff (6' 36") initiation is delayed, the infiltration rates (38.63 mm h<sup>-1</sup>) are high, and the runoff coefficient (11.2 % after 30 minutes and 19.4 % after 60 minutes) and the erosion rates (13 g m<sup>2</sup> h<sup>-1</sup>) are low. On the contrary, over Cretaceous marls, the ponding (1’ 37") and the surface runoff (2' 52") initiation is very rapid, the infiltration rates are low (11.2 mm h<sup>-1<…
Human-induced changes in the soil cover at the mouth of the Vistula River Cross-Cut (northern Poland)
2015
Celem badań było określenie wpływu działalności człowieka na powstawanie gleb w rejonie ujęcia Przekopu Wisły. Szczegółowe badania przeprowadzono na obszarze testowym (około 500 ha), dla którego została wykonana mapa gleb. Wydzielono trzy główne pasy grupujące gleby wytworzone z osadów morskich, eolicznych i technogenicznych, naturalnie i antropogenicznie zdeponowanych w wyniku regulacji hydrotechnicznych. Do dominujących gleb należą: gleby inicjalne, arenosole, glejowe,marsze i gleby industrialne, które charakteryzują się dużą zmiennością przestrzenną oraz występowaniem profili wieloczłonowych. Ich właściwości odzwierciedlają zróżnicowaną dynamikę środowiska w skali lokalnej po obu stronac…
Finite-Element Modeling of Floodplain Flow
2000
A new methodology for a robust solution of the diffusive shallow water equations is proposed. The methodology splits the unknowns of the momentum and continuity equations into one kinematic and one parabolic component. The kinematic component is solved using the slope of the water level surface computed in the previous time-step and a zero-order approximation of the water head inside the mass-balance area around each node of the mesh. The parabolic component is found by applying a standard finite-element Galerkin procedure, where the source terms can be computed from the solution of the previous kinematic problem. A simple 1D case, with a known analytical solution, is used to test the accur…
Wastewater Reuse Effects on Soil Hydraulic Conductivity
2004
The wastewater total suspended solids (TSS) concentration effects on the saturated hydraulic conductivity, \iK\ds, of a clay and a loam soil were investigated on laboratory repacked soil cores by a constant head permeameter. Both municipal wastewater (MW) and artificial wastewater (AW) with different TSS concentrations were used, with the aim to evaluate, by comparison, the effects of biological activity. The development of a surface sealed layer was investigated in loam soil columns supplied with AW and equipped with water manometers at different depths to detect the hydraulic head gradient changes. In the loam soil, \iK\ds reduced to about 80% of the initial value after infiltration of 17…
Testing alternative erosivity indices to predict event soil loss from bare plots in Southern Italy
2009
Methods for predicting unit plot soil loss for the ‘Sparacia’ Sicilian (Southern Italy) site were developed using 316 simultaneous measurements of runoff and soil loss from individual bare plots varying in length from 11 to 44 m. The event unit plot soil loss was directly proportional to an erosivity index equal to (QREI30)1·47, being QREI30 the runoff ratio (QR) times the single storm erosion index (EI30). The developed relationship represents a modified version of the USLE-M, and therefore it was named USLE-MM. By the USLE-MM, a constant erodibility coefficient was deduced for plots of different lengths, suggesting that in this case the calculated erodibility factor is representative of a…