TITLE:
Linking Numerical Water Quality Models in an Environmental Information System for Integrated Environmental Assessments
AUTHORS:
Franklin Torres-Bejarano, Hermilo Ramirez, Ralf Denzer, Steven Frysinger, Thorsten Hell, Sascha Schlobinski
KEYWORDS:
Environmental Information Systems; Environmental Decision Support Systems; Water Quality Modeling; Integrated Modeling
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Environmental Protection,
Vol.4 No.7A,
July
18,
2013
ABSTRACT: Decision makers involved in
prevention of water contamination often lack the technical knowledge of water
quality evaluation or the comprehension of complex software for environmental
information management required to make effective decisions. Providing
information about the environment is not an easy task due to its complex
structure, relationships, and dynamic processes. Because environmental models
play an important role in environmental decision support systems, the
integration of models into user-friendly integrated information systems is a
key factor in the support of such users. This paper presents an environmental
information system which supports water protection of Coatzacoalcos River in
Mexico, having as a main building block water quality assessments supported by
mathematical modeling through the two-dimensional Saint Venant and Advection-Diffusion-Reaction
equations to calculate the river hydrodynamics and the contaminant transport,
respectively. The mathematical modeling solution yields appropriate results
representing the river contaminant distribution when compared with field
measurements. But the direct use of these models by decision makers is
difficult at best, meaning they are not
likely to be used in making practical decisions. The system described in
this paper integrates these models, and several other tools, into a seamless,
user-centered application, improving model usability, initial configuration,
and results visualization.