Strategic Evaluation Tool for Surface Water Quality Management Remedies in Drinking Water Catchments

Abstract

Drinking water catchments (DWC) are under pressure from point and nonpoint source pollution due to the growing human activities. This worldwide challenge is causing number of adverse effects, such as degradation in water quality, ecosystem health, and other economic and social pressures. Different evaluation tools have been developed to achieve sustainable and healthy drinking water catchments. However, a holistic and strategic framework is still required to adequately consider the uncertainty associated with feasible management remedies of surface water quality in drinking water catchments. A strategic framework was developed to adequately consider the uncertainty associated with management remedies for surface water quality in drinking water catchments. A Fuzzy Multiple Criteria Decision Analysis (FMCDA) approach was embedded into a strategic decision support framework to evaluate and rank water quality remediation options within a typical fixed budget constraint faced by bulk water providers. The evaluation framework consists of four core aspects; namely, water quality, environmental, economic and social, and number of associated quantitative and qualitative criteria and sub-criteria. Final remediation strategy ranking was achieved through the application of the Euclidean Distance by the In-center of Centroids (EDIC).

Faster and safer: Research priorities in water and health

“…Loss of hospital water supplies (e.g., due to a crisis or intermittent service) puts patients at greater risk and often requires compromises in sanitary procedures or physiologically stressful patient transfers. Approach and methodology options for addressing uncertainty and unknown risks include the precautionary principle, expert consultation, probabilistic inference, sensitivity tests, fuzzy-set theory, value-based weighting preferences, or conditional rules (Almaarofi et al, 2017;Dominguez-Chicas and Scrimshaw, 2010;Petterson and Ashbolt, 2016). Automated data production, management, and decision-support systems may aid in earlier detection of risks, enabling faster response times.…”

Identifying Surface Runoff Pathways for Cost-Effective Mitigation of Pollutant Inputs to Drinking Water Reservoir

“…In numerous regions of the world, the problem of point sources of pollution, connected mainly with insufficient wastewater treatment, is efficiently solved through the construction of new and the modernisation of existing wastewater treatment plants, as well as the expansion of sewage systems. Nonpoint source (NPS) pollution is the leading remaining cause of water quality problems on a local, regional and global scale [1][2][3][4][5].…”

“…The process requires the removal of algal cells and toxins, as well as related off-tastes and odours. HABs have become a significant driver of water treatment costs [2,[19][20][21].…”