Organizational Unit:

Georgia Water Resources Institute

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https://hdl.handle.net/1853/70796

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Organizational Unit

School of Civil and Environmental Engineering

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 1767

HAZUS-MH: Looking at the Probabilistic Effects of Hurricanes over the Georgia Coast in the Changing Climate and Remedial Suggestions

(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2013-04) Panda, Sudhanshu S. ; Rumiser, Brandon

Due to Global Warming & Climate Change, in recent times, Coastal United States is experiencing increased landfall of hurricanes. HAZUS-MH is a regional multi-hazard loss estimation model that was developed by FEMA and the National Institute of Building Sciences. The objective of the study was to use HAZUS-MH to create a probabilistic hurricane impact model for coastal Georgia, analyze the results with different scenarios, and suggest remedial measures for stakeholders. HAZUS-MH is an add-on for ArcGIS 10. Most of the geospatial data used in this hurricane model building came with the HAZUS-MH program. It provides locations of facilities, roads, trees, surface roughness, and many more including the census data. Other data used in the model building was retrieved from the FEMA, HAZUS, and NOAA websites. HAZUS modeling was conducted in four basic phases, 1) organize resources, 2) assess risks, 3) develop a mitigation plan, and 4) implement the plan and monitor progress. The model calculated several results but we selected only a few for analysis. Some of these results, we observed and analyzed include damage estimations, loss of use charts, and debris calculations. Major analysis was conducted to observe how the trees affect the wind speeds of the hurricanes with multiple multi-year assessments. As the wind passes through the tree barriers there were significant drops in wind speed all the way through the study area. Our analysis proved that the hurricane impact was severein the area where there was lack of forest and the impact was minimized where there were tall trees or forest cover. Supporting the primary purpose of HAZUS-MH, we estimated the multi-hazard losses at our study area scale and suggested remedial measures through our advance analysis for local, state and regional officials to stimulate efforts to reduce risks from such hurricane.
An Evaluation of the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) in Georgia

(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2013-04) Atreya, Ajita

Both capital and people have been moving into flood plains and other high-risk areas and there are serious issues about whether they are aware of the risk, and whether they are adequately covered and remain so over time. This paper promises to advance our understanding of how homeowners behave vis-à-vis flood risk, and ultimately, it aims to evaluate the performance of the National flood Insurance Program (NFIP) in Georgia regarding reducing vulnerability. This is done (i) by identifying participation rates in risk areas (which will determine its effectiveness) and (ii) by identifying the distribution of NFIP across income groups (which will determine its equity implications). With more than 40 years of history behind NFIP and the results well documented, the distributional implication of NFIP can be measured quantitatively using a Lorenz curve measure of inequality. The progressivity of the NFIP is measured as the departure of total county premium and program payout from per capita county income proportionality. In addition, the effectiveness of the NFIP will be measured by determining its participation rate i.e. by determining the percent of NFIP policies-in-force in a county divided by the percent of county in the flood risk zone. It is expected that the premium will be proportional since there are no income based discount in NFIP rates. However, the fact that over a third of policy holders live outside the floodplain suggests that the premium could be progressive assuming that the voluntary participation comes from the wealthiest income groups. Since both lower and higher income people live in flood hazard areas, it is expected that the payments could be progressive or regressive depending on whether the riskier area is lower income or higher income.
Phase II coastal Georgia OSDS inspection, compliance, geolocation and analysis a Georgia EPD 319(h) funded project

(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2013-04) Bodrey, Ray

The population in coastal Georgia is growing at a significant rate. Coastal cities have limited funding and time to upgrade their municipal treatment plant infrastructure to counter the rise in population. Therefore, on-site septic disposal systems (septic tank and drainfield systems) have and will continue to be heavily permitted. It is extremely important to geo-locate these systems to enable better public health planning. These systems have the potential to impair water quality greatly if not maintained, thus causing serious health concerns to both humans and wildlife.
Nutrient Trading Framework in the Coosa Basin

(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2013-04) Hawks, Laurie

The Northwest Georgia Partnership is a group of water providers in Coosa Basin and surrounding watersheds. The Partnership is facing new permit limits in the Coosa Basin for wastewater discharges due to the Lake Weiss TMDL. GAEPD has proposed Total Phosphorus limits of 1 mg/L on all major dischargers. For some facilities, this represents a significant investment to meet these requirements. The Partnership applied for and received a USEPA 319(h) grant to evaluate Nutrient Trading in the Coosa Basin, set up a framework to implement trading, and identify a demonstration trade between a point source and non-point source BMP. There are many potential benefits to water quality trading including achieving pollution reduction goals at an overall lower cost, targeting reduction closer to the water body of concern, and engaging non-point sources that may not have other regulatory incentives to meet reductions. If a trade and framework are implemented, it would be the first in the state of Georgia. The presentation will include benefits of trading, common elements of a trading framework, phosphorus runoff coefficients, point and non-point costs, and example trade with non-point BMPs concept plan.
Development of a Molecular Monitoring Tool for Imperiled Herpetofauna of the Southeastern U.S.

(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2013-04) McKee, Anna Miriam ; Calhoun, Daniel ; Barichivish, William ; Spear, Stephens ; Coldberg, Caren ; Glenn, Travis

Molecular techniques have recently been demonstrated to be effective and efficient methods for detecting presence of species across a range of aquatic systems. The general method includes the isolation of environmental DNA (eDNA) from focal taxa via water filtration and DNA amplification. The simplicity, costeffectiveness, and non-invasiveness of these techniques for detecting presence of rare and cryptic species suggests great potential for incorporation into inventory and monitoring programs of aquatic species. In this study, we developed and tested eDNA markers for several imperiled pond-breeding amphibian species of Georgia and Florida; the flatwoods salamanders (Ambystoma bishopi and A. cingulatum), gopher frog (Rana capito), and striped newt (Notophthalmus perstriatus), under both lab and field conditions. We report the effectiveness of these markers to detect species presence under both controlled and natural conditions and discuss the potential for these markers to be incorporated into inventory and monitoring programs of amphibians in the southeastern U.S.
Declaring Drought for Effective Water Management

(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2013-04) McKay, S. Kyle ; Rasmussen, Todd C.

Water managers are tasked with resolving conflicts between freshwater resource uses, which range from municipal water supply, to recreation, and to sustaining aquatic ecosystem integrity. Further complicating management, hydrologic processes experience numerous sources of periodic, quasi-periodic, and episodic variation. Water allocation tradeoffs are often most complex and contentious when availability is low. Drought is a “recurring extreme climatic event over land characterized by below-normal precipitation over a period of months to years” (Dai 2011). Water managers often apply indicators of climatologic and hydrologic conditions to identify when drought conditions are reached (e.g., Palmer Drought Severity Index, streamflow, respectively). These indicators inform drought declarations, with associated drought responses such as watering restrictions. Herein, we suggest techniques for predicting and declaring oncoming drought to improve the accuracy of drought declarations. We hypothesize that drought indicators in preceding months are predictive of future drought levels. Specifically, we develop predictive models using the Palmer Hydrologic Drought Index, a common drought indicator. We then demonstrate the utility of our model for drought declarations for the Middle Oconee River near Athens.
Improving South Fork Peachtree Creek watershed using the triple bottom line – DeKalb County, Georgia

(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2013-04) Chastant, David

Restoring two streams, two lakes, and protecting a buffer are part of a plan to improve the health of South Fork Peachtree Creek based on environmental, social and financial criteria. DeKalb County is similar to many metro-Atlanta Georgia communities with a Storm Water Management Plan and a Watershed Protection Plan to fulfill state and federal regulations. In developing Watershed Management Plans to satisfy these requirements, DeKalb County chose to use the triple bottom line (TBL) approach to prioritize different Watershed Improvement Plans. The prioritization method allows flexibility and consistency while evaluating environmental, social and economic measures and identifying projects with the greatest value per dollar. We wanted a TBL model that used science based methods and was easy to implement to determine if a project would benefit the health of the stream. A TBL model that can evaluate the best environmental project must be able to recognize that there are different types of assets and include projects such as detention pond retrofits and stream restoration projects. The Prioritization Matrix developed here uses a grid analysis to weigh different TBL measures in order to select the best overall environmental project.
Hydro-Climatic Trends in the Southeastern US

(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2013-04) Regan, Jeffrey ; Georgakakos, Aristidis P.

Indications of a climatic change on a global scale are increasingly calling into question what we know about and what to expect from our own local climates. A changing climate means the traditional method of using historical hydro-climatic conditions as expected conditions in water planning and management may be unwise. New methods for determining and characterizing expected local hydro-climatic conditions should consider an evaluation of how historical local hydro-climatic conditions have changed over time. In this sense, an evaluation of hydro-climatic trends in the Southeastern US has been developed using historical records from weather gages. Trends for monthly precipitation, maximum and minimum temperatures, evaporation, and stream flow have been developed for various historic time intervals during 1909 to 2009. The historic hydro-climatic trends have been plotted and mapped in a manner to easily show seasonal and regional shifts that have occurred in the past 50 and 100 years. These trends vary by season and location, and there are few trends that appear to be region-wide and no trends that appear year-round. In the past 100 years the annual temperature records region-wide indicate a cooling trend strongest during winter and fall and weakest during summer months. However 50-year trends indicate a warming trend in almost all months region-wide. The 100-year trends of precipitation indicate an increase in annual precipitation in most areas, however, a decrease during the driest summer months. The 50-year trends indicate a decrease in annual precipitation and increased evaporation in almost all regions. Identification and illustration of these trends is an important step in debunking the traditional notion that “what was, will be” and moving towards a non-stationary hydro-climatic approach to water planning and management.
Analysis of Georgia Conservation Lands: for Endangered & Threatened Fish and Mussel Species and Biota Listed Streams Using Geospatial Technology

(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2013-04) Panda, Sudhanshu Sekhar ; Brossett, Michele P.

In United States of America (US), as part of the Clean Water Act (CWA) Section 101 (a), it is the obligation of each state to monitor and assess the chemical, physical, and biological conditions of streams within its boundaries for human and animal consumption and to sustain aquatic animals. As Georgia’s population continues to grow, the state will have increased runoff from non-point sources combined with the continual loss of critical habitat. With the use of geospatial technology, this study is intended to determine which areas need to be conserved for fish and mussels and to determine if the potential opportunity conservation areas covers all the fish and mussels habitats in Georgia. Several conservation geospatial layers including 303d list of impaired rivers in Georgia were collected from different authentic sources. They were processed in ArcGIS 10 to prepare them for analysis. Fish and Mussels habitat spatial layer was separately created from the available ASCII format data. The spatial location of the habitats were correlated to the 12-digit HUC watershed of Georgia and the critical watersheds were determined with respect to fish and mussels habitat conservation. Present conservation land spatial layer of Georgia was obtained and compared with the critical watershed layer using Map Algebra. Thus, the area erroneously provided with the present GA conservation land layer were determined and correct spatial locations for fish and mussels conservation was suggested. In Georgia, 439 critical 12-digit HUC watersheds were found for fish and mussels conservation. Above all, the entire study procedure was modeled through an automated geospatial model developed using ArcGIS 10 Model Builder. This analysis would help conversationalist, regional development authorities, and other groups to determine where the best area would be to conduct restoration on streams and would help them find funding or would use existing funding wisely.
Estimation of Reservoir Storage Capacity Using Terrestrial Lidar and Multibeam Sonar, Randy Poynter Lake, Rockdale County, Georgia

(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2013-04) Lee, Katie

Randy Poynter Lake is a 650-acre reservoir that was constructed to meet the drinking water needs of Rockdale County. The Lake was formed following impoundment of Big Haynes Creek with the construction of Jack Turner Dam. Suspended sediment monitoring on Big Haynes Creek has indicated excessive sediment yields upstream of the reservoir. An accurate 3-dimensional model of the lake will provide the current storage capacity of the lake as well as establish a baseline for monitoring future sedimentation. In 2012, the U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with Rockdale Water Resources collected topographic and bathymetric data at Randy Poynter Lake simultaneously using a marine-based mobile mapping unit to estimate storage capacity. Bathymetric data were collected using multibeam and singlebeam echo sounders. Topographic data were collected using a marine-based mobile mapping light detection and ranging (LIDAR) system, real-time kinematic global positioning system (GPS), and conventional surveying methods. The mobile mapping unit was operated in conjunction with a position and orientation system and GPS base station. The datasets were combined and a 3-dimensional model was created for the reservoir to generate a stage-storage curve.