Discover the Editor's Choice: From each issue of the leading journal, Water Science & Technology, a member of the Editorial Board selects one outstanding paper to share across IWA Publishing platforms.
IWA Publishing is pleased to announce that the 61st Editor's Choice Paper, chosen by Dr. Miaomiao Ye, is:
Marina Batalini de Macedo; Thalita Raquel Pereira de Oliveira; Tassiana Halmenschlager Oliveira; Marcus Nóbrega Gomes Junior; José Artur Teixeira Brasil; Cesar Ambrogi Ferreira do Lago; Eduardo Mario Mendiondo
Why was this paper chosen?
Global climate change has caused local rainstorm events to increase and become more frequent. In addition, the urbanization process has greatly increased the impervious surface of the area, which has further led to the frequent occurrence of urban flooding disasters. Rainwater runoff carries a large amount of sediment, organic matter, nitrogen, phosphorus, and metals into the water body, which is easy to cause water pollution. Low-impact development (LID) practice is considered to be an effective way to solve the problems of urban flooding and urban water environment deterioration. In addition to the initial aims of runoff control, reconstruction of the natural hydrological cycle, and reduction of pollutant load, recent LID practice research has begun to be combined with the achievement of sustainable development goals (SDGs).
Macedo et al. conducted a preliminary comprehensive assessment of how a bioretention system (a typical form of LID) can contribute to the SDGs. The focus was given to flood control, non-potable water demands (NPD), and resources co-management. The efficiencies obtained for laboratory scale were extrapolated for household and watershed scale, quantifying the indicators of water demand reduction (WDR), energy demand reduction (EDR), and carbon emission reduction (CER) for hybrid systems with LID.
The use of a bioretention system with a submerged zone can improve the quality of the water recovered for reuse, while maintaining the efficiency of runoff retention and peak flow attenuation. When evaluating the system on the watershed scale, the bioretention helped to reduce NPD demands up to 45%, leading to a reduction in energy demand and carbon emission from the centralized water supply system.
This paper extends the role of LID to SDGs, I am quite confident that WS&T readers will enjoy this paper.
Miaomiao Ye, Editor