Grantee Research Project Results
Final Report: Developing a Small Business in Response to a Stormwater Utility for the New Jersey Meadowlands
EPA Grant Number: SU833552Title: Developing a Small Business in Response to a Stormwater Utility for the New Jersey Meadowlands
Investigators: Obropta, Christopher , Silang, Jericho , Kang, Kathleen , Rashkovsky, Michael , Flaherty, Robert
Institution: Rutgers
EPA Project Officer: Page, Angela
Phase: I
Project Period: August 31, 2007 through July 31, 2008
Project Amount: $10,000
RFA: P3 Awards: A National Student Design Competition for Sustainability Focusing on People, Prosperity and the Planet (2007) RFA Text | Recipients Lists
Research Category: Pollution Prevention/Sustainable Development , P3 Challenge Area - Safe and Sustainable Water Resources , P3 Awards , Sustainable and Healthy Communities
Objective:
The New Jersey Meadowlands District is an area approximately 18,000 acres located in the middle of a natural wetlands system. The constant development of the area for the past 150 years has resulted in the transformation of 10,000 acres of wetlands into commercial center surrounded by 8,000 acres of wetlands. Due to combination of low lying elevation of the area, excessive urbanization, disruption of the natural hydrology of the basin and other factors a significant amount of the sections of the District are in constant distress from regularly occurring flooding events. To alleviate the flooding problems in the New Jersey Meadowlands District the formation of a stormwater utility has been proposed. A stormwater utility will maintain present infrastructure, implement best management designs and provided user credits to property owners for installing suggested BMPs. The funding for these stormwater management services will come from property owners charged with a fee based upon their contribution to stormwater runoff. The goal of this project is to develop a financially feasible business plan for a small business to service the property owners within the stormwater utility district to help them minimize the stormwater runoff from their property, thereby reducing their impact on the environment and reducing their stormwater utility fee.
Two areas experiencing flood problems from the Town of Moonachie were selected as demonstration sites. These two sites, Carol Place and Grand Street, were determined to be suitable for this project since both are industrial sites financially affected by floods due to mostly impervious surface, poor stormwater facilities and tidal issues. In addition, the industrial nature of the sites introduces the potential of hazardous constituents being present in stormwater runoff. The Design Team operating as the proposed small business assessed the sites and determined the severity of the stormwater runoff. Appropriate stormwater management facilities were designed based on the level of stormwater reduction that can be achieved with the implementation of these designs. A cost benefit analysis will be performed to ascertain if it is financially practical and beneficial for a property owner to hire a small business to help them reduce their stormwater impact, thereby reducing their utility fee.
The implementation of the proposed designs will produced outcomes such as the improvement of the quality of life of employees of the selected industrial sites, removal or alleviation of the financial burden caused by floods and reduction of hazardous materials that maybe present in the runoffs from these sites. This project encompass sustainability on three fronts, the protection of property and health (people), the protection of industry (prosperity), and the protection of wetlands (planet). The success of this project may also introduce an environmentally beneficial and profitable business plan.
Summary/Accomplishments (Outputs/Outcomes):
The main causes of flooding have been identified to be clogged catch basins and tidal gates, the lot being poorly graded and mostly impervious, lack of pumping systems and tidal issues. The unmaintained existing infrastructure such as broken or non-functional tidal gates, drainage ditches, and pipes compounds the incapability of the area to handle even small storm events. Implementation of best management of practices in the selected sites will alleviate the flooding. In New Jersey, water quality BMPs are designed to control runoff from the water quality storm, which is defined as 1.25 inches of rain over two hours. By designing for the water quality storm, the BMP will treat approximately 90% of New Jersey’s annual storms, since most of the rainfall comes in storms of less than 1.25 inches. Stormwater BMPs that are designed for quantity control are used to reduce the peak stormwater runoff for the 2-, 10- and 100-year design storms, which are defined as 24-hour rainfall events of 3.3 inches, 5.3 inches, and 8.7 inches, respectively. Taking these storm events into consideration, the team has decided to use the following BMPs for implementation at the Moonachie site:
- Green Roof
- Cisterns
- Hydrodynamic Separation Systems
These are the most suitable BMPs for the Town of Moonachie that will reduce roof runoff, retain water for reuse and prevent clogging of drainage system. In addition to BMPs, pumps, solar panels to power some of the pumps and burms will be built or installed to provide additional aid to stormwater runoff reduction.
Working in conjunction with NJMC has proven to be beneficial to the project’s success. The design group was provided detailed AutoCAD drawings and GIS files that were of an enormous aid to the designing the proper BMPs. Also, with the assistance of NJMC, the group has become acquainted with the community including the Mayor of Moonachie, which will be considerably helpful when the final implementation steps are ready to be taken.
Conclusions:
This project is to address the topic of sustainability environmentally and financially. The creation of the stormwater utility will significantly decrease pressures on the environment by eliminating strenuous water inputs of higher quantity and lower quality. With the creation of a stormwater utility in the New Jersey Meadowlands and other areas of New Jersey, the unique opportunity arises for small businesses to offer consulting services to commercial and industrial facilities in need of BMPs in order to reduce stormwater runoff for user fee credits or primarily just to reduce economically obtrusive flooding. The implementation of the designed BMPs will achieve more than demonstrating this small business concept but also improve quality of life, aid in the prosperity of industry and most importantly the protection of wetlands.
Proposed Phase II Objectives and Strategies
The proposed design for in Moonachie along with the business plan will demonstrate to the greater community of the New Jersey Meadowlands Region that proper design of BMPs can have an positive effect on the environment and the lives of the residents in that environment. The BMPs designed by the team will be innovative to the rest of New Jersey in their design due to the constraints presented to the design team by the natural conditions of the site. The business plan will be another demonstration project for the community to see how a Stormwater Utility will maintain and improve the stormwater infrastructure of the New Jersey Meadowlands Region. The utility will not be an omnipotent institution that charges the land owners of the site whatever it pleases but the land owners in the region will have some control over the fee by being able to improve their property on a stormwater management basis to lower their fee.
The cistern will collect stormwater from the roof of two industrial buildings on site. The cisterns for each building will be routed into the building to be used for toilet water. This will increase the sustainability of each building and reduce water costs for each building. The cistern will also have a connection to the stream bank. The invert of the connection from the cistern will be below the median elevation of the stream. This will not maximize the reuse of the water through toilets but it will capture the maximum amount of runoff throughout the year and increase the time of concentration for the runoff of the roof entering the stream thus reducing flooding on site.
One of the reasons the site floods during storm events is that the storm sewer system is routinely clogged with sediment and debris due to a lack of maintenance. Manufactured Treatment devices will be installed into the existing stormwater sewer system to collect the sediment and debris at a few points in the system. This will reduce the maintenance cost of the stormwater sewer system on the site. While lowering the maintenance cost the stormwater sewer should operate much better and reduce flooding.
Supplemental Keywords:
Water, groundwater, land, sediments, precipitation, ecological effects, pollution prevention, treatment, effluent, discharge, bioremediation, public good, sustainable development, socioeconomic, engineering, social science, ecology, monitoring, surveys, ecosystems, environmental engineering, watersheds, best management practices, BMP, stormwater drainage, stormwater treatment, flood,Relevant Websites:
http://www.water.rutgers.edu Exit
http://www.meadowlands.state.nj.us/index.html Exit
The perspectives, information and conclusions conveyed in research project abstracts, progress reports, final reports, journal abstracts and journal publications convey the viewpoints of the principal investigator and may not represent the views and policies of ORD and EPA. Conclusions drawn by the principal investigators have not been reviewed by the Agency.