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USING HYDROGRAPHIC DATA AND THE EPA VIRTUAL BEACH MODEL TO TEST PREDICTIONS OF BEACH BACTERIA CONCENTRATIONS
Citation:
FRICK, W. E. AND Z. GE. USING HYDROGRAPHIC DATA AND THE EPA VIRTUAL BEACH MODEL TO TEST PREDICTIONS OF BEACH BACTERIA CONCENTRATIONS. Presented at ERF 2007, Providence, RI, November 04 - 08, 2007.
Impact/Purpose:
A main objective of this task is to combine empirical and physical mechanisms in a model, known as Visual Beach, that
- is user-friendly
- includes point and non-point sources of contamination
- includes the latest bacterial decay mechanisms
- incorporates real-time and web-based ambient and atmospheric and aquatic conditions
- and has a predictive capability of up to three days to help avert potential beach closures.
Description:
A modeling study of 2006 Huntington Beach (Lake Erie) beach bacteria concentrations indicates multi-variable linear regression (MLR) can effectively estimate bacteria concentrations compared to the persistence model. Our use of the Virtual Beach (VB) model affirms that fact. VB is public-domain software developed at the USEPA, including an MLR model. The study involved a suite of explanatory variables, however stream flow variables describing point sources more directly, while available, were not used. Results presented by Nevers et al. (2007) showed that current reversals were associated with changes in beach bacteria concentrations. This work analyzes available hydrological data, adjusting for travel times, to assess their model potential. If the differences are found to be statistically significant, the work should help to put the importance of source strength into perspective to other important explanatory variables.