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Supply Chain Design for Nutrient Management and Harmful Algal Blooms Minimization
Citation:
Hu, Y., A. Sampat, V. Zavala, AND G. Ruiz-Mercado. Supply Chain Design for Nutrient Management and Harmful Algal Blooms Minimization. International Congress on Sustainability Science & Engineering, Cincinnati, OH, August 12 - 15, 2018.
Impact/Purpose:
This poster presentation and its corresponding abstract describe the adaptation and application of multiple types of modeling tools to analyze the quantitative relationship between nutrient management strategies from organic waste and harmful algal blooms (HABs). This work informs stakeholders when conducting systematic studies on the effect of multiple objectives for decision-making as needed for SHC Decision Science and Support Tools project. Also, this can support the Nutrient management and HABs research being conducted in SSWR.
Description:
The harmful algal blooms (HABs) is a universal and complex problem throughout the world. The explosion of algae increasingly pollutes both marine and freshwater ecosystems and can subsequently affect their surroundings drastically. The HABs can lead to severe human health threats and enormous remediation costs by generating toxicity risk for humans, aquatic life, decreasing economic value of recreational water systems due to color and odor issues [1][2]. It is estimated that 30% of lakes from 36 states in the US have reported HABs problems [3]. The US EPA reported the corresponding tourism losses and commercial fishing losses reached one billion and more than ten million dollars per year respectively [4]. It is widely known that nutrient pollution (especially nitrogen and phosphorous) is the key reason for HABs. The nutrient pollution comes from two types of nutrient sources: non-point source and point source. The non-point sources include nutrient release from agricultural land, natural land, stormwater etc., and the point sources include nutrient release from organic waste originated in permitted facilities, e.g., wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) [5]. To properly deal with HABs, more advanced strategies regarding nutrient management should be implemented to reduce nutrient pollution from both point and non-point sources. By designing appropriate supply chain networks for organic waste management, transportation, and technology placement for processing, the nutrients in animal waste, biosolids, and food waste can be sustainably recycled and reused by crops, grazing animals, and humans. In this project, we combine multiple types of modeling tools to analyze the relationship between nutrient management strategies from organic waste and HABs. The first part is a supply chain modeling framework, which captures the balance and transformation of waste, nutrient, and product at each location, waste transportation, recovered products, and technology selection, sizing, and placement [6]. This supply chain model can achieve the coordination among stakeholders with different objectives by minimizing a weighted summation of investment, transportation, and operational costs, and health threats, economic loss and environmental impacts caused by HABs. The second part is a nutrient transport model, which can track the nutrient releases from organic waste, the fate, and transport process from the soil to aquatic systems. The third part is an algal bloom prediction model to relate the nutrient concentration and other natural factors (temperature, sunlight etc.) and algal bloom level [7]. Finally, we compared the predicted algal bloom level with threshold suggested by US EPA [8] to analyze the HABs response to nutrient management actions. We will present a series of real case studies in the Yahara Watershed in the State of Wisconsin to illustrate the model structure and practicability. [1] Hallegraeff G M. A review of harmful algal blooms and their apparent global increase[J]. Phycologia, 1993, 32(2): 79-99. [2] Heisler J, Glibert P M, Burkholder J A M, et al. Eutrophication and harmful algal blooms: a scientific consensus[J]. Harmful algae, 2008, 8(1): 3-13. [3] Graham J, Dortch Q. An Overview of Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs) and Their Impacts in Freshwater and Marine Ecosystems. EPA Presentation. [4] Nutrient Pollution Effects: Economy https://www.epa.gov/nutrientpollution/effects-economy [5] Nutrient Pollution Sources and Solutions https://www.epa.gov/nutrientpollution/sources-and-solutions [6] Sampat A M, Martin E, Martin M, et al. Optimization formulations for multi-product supply chain networks[J]. Computers & Chemical Engineering, 2017, 104: 296-310. [7] Elliott J A. Is the future blue-green? A review of the current model predictions of how climate change could affect pelagic freshwater cyanobacteria[J]. Water research, 2012, 46(5): 1