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Effectiveness of coastal green infrastructure under compound events due to climate change
Thesis   Open access

Effectiveness of coastal green infrastructure under compound events due to climate change

Ian E. Lempitsky
Master of Science (M.S.), Drexel University
Jun 2018
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17918/D8KQ19
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Abstract

Water resources development--Management Sustainable development--Planning Sea level Civil Engineering
Green Infrastructure (GI) has become an increasingly prevalent method of supplementing grey infrastructure to manage stormwater. Most GI uses infiltration into the soil as a method of stormwater management and therefore the facilities are generally built with a setback from the coast line due to fear of lack of infiltration into saturated soils in high water tables. This paper analyzes a constructed wetland built in Flushing, New York that was built on the shoreline of Meadow Lake and its performance in stormwater retention. The wetland has been monitored for three seasons and the observed data points were used to calibrate a hydrologic model of the system. The model predicts that for Scenario 1, 42%, 67% and 44% of stormwater was retained in each respective reason, proving the site to be valuable for the area. The model was then subject to two different climate change scenarios that include (1) higher evapotranspiration and higher precipitation, and (2) sea level rise in Meadow Lake that would affect the wetland. Scenario 2 proved that up to 90% of stormwater was managed by the wetland but Scenario 3 showed that as low as 18% was managed. Finally, Scenario 4 managed 87% of stormwater. While this analysis proves to be beneficial to manage stormwater, there may be other ecological effects that were beyond the scope of this research.

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