River Channelization

Surian, Nicola

doi:10.1201/noe0849396274.ch241

Cited by 1 publication

(1 citation statement)

References 7 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…The choice of longer subsequent river sections of 10km reflects a compromise between reasonable computation times and sufficient detail to arrive at representative CFs over long river distances. In terms of geometry, the rivers are assumed to be rectangular channels as is the case for many rivers in Europe, the U.S., and other industrialized countries . Also the rivers Aare and Rhine are (partly) corrected and embanked over a considerable distance (e.g., ref ).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Characterization Factors for Thermal Pollution in Freshwater Aquatic Environments

Verones

Hanafiah

Pfister

et al. 2010

Environ. Sci. Technol.

105

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

To date the impact of thermal emissions has not been addressed in life cycle assessment despite the narrow thermal tolerance of most aquatic species. A method to derive characterization factors for the impact of cooling water discharges on aquatic ecosystems was developed which uses space and time explicit integration of fate and effects of water temperature changes. The fate factor is calculated with a 1-dimensional steady-state model and reflects the residence time of heat emissions in the river. The effect factor specifies the loss of species diversity per unit of temperature increase and is based on a species sensitivity distribution of temperature tolerance intervals for various aquatic species. As an example, time explicit characterization factors were calculated for the cooling water discharge of a nuclear power plant in Switzerland, quantifying the impact on aquatic ecosystems of the rivers Aare and Rhine. The relative importance of the impact of these cooling water discharges was compared with other impacts in life cycle assessment. We found that thermal emissions are relevant for aquatic ecosystems compared to other stressors, such as chemicals and nutrients. For the case of nuclear electricity investigated, thermal emissions contribute between 3% and over 90% to Ecosystem Quality damage.

show abstract

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%