This work examines the impact of discharge decisions under uncertainty in a capacity-constrained high risk setting: the intensive care unit (ICU). New arrivals to an ICU are typically very high priority patients and, should the ICU be full upon their arrival, discharging a patient currently residing in the ICU may be required to accommodate a newly admitted patient. Patients so discharged risk ...

[1] River suspended-sediment concentrations provide insights to the erosion and transport of materials from a landscape, and changes in concentrations with time may result from landscape processes or human disturbance. Here we show that suspended-sediment concentrations in the Santa Ana River, California, decreased 20-fold with respect to discharge during a 34-year period (1968 2001). These dec...

In off-grid wind energy systems batteries often undergo frequent charge discharge cycles, which reduce battery service life. In addition, due to motor start and other high ‘inrush current’ loads batteries can also undergo high rates of discharge which also degrade battery life. In this paper, a superconducting magnetic energy storage and battery hybrid energy storage system is proposed which is...

External nitrogen (N) inputs originating from human activities act as essential nutrients accumulation in aquatic ecosystems or it is exported elsewhere, where the assimilation capacity surpassed. This research presents a multi-annual case study of dissolved inorganic (DIN) an urban river Ontario (Canada), assessed changes N downstream largest wastewater treatment plant (WTP) watershed. Changes...

A combination of above-normal precipitation during the winter and spring of 2007-2008 and extensive rainfall during June 2008 led to severe flooding in many parts of the midwestern United States. This resulted in transport of substantial amounts of nutrients and sediment from Iowa basins into the Mississippi River. Water samples were collected from 31 sites on six large Iowa tributaries to the ...

Uncertainty estimates corresponding to measured hydrologic and water quality data can contribute to improved monitoring design, decision-making, model application, and regulatory formulation. With these benefits in mind, the Data Uncertainty Estimation Tool for Hydrology and Water Quality (DUET-H/ WQ) was developed from an existing uncertainty estimation framework for small watershed discharge,...

Most of the wastewater treatment systems in small rural communities of the Cova da Beira region (Portugal) consist of constructed wetlands (CW) with horizontal subsurface flow (HSSF). It is believed that those systems allow the compliance of discharge standards as well as the production of final effluents with suitability for reuse. Results obtained in a nine-month campaign in an HSSF bed point...

The reunification of Germany led to dramatically reduced emissions of nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) to the environment. The aim of the present study was to examine how these exceptional decreases influenced the amounts of nutrients carried by the Elbe River to the North Sea. In particular, we attempted to extract anthropogenic signals from time series of riverine loads of nitrogen and phospho...