1 Introduction to “Water Resources Management in Romania”
11
1.7 Case Studies
Chapter 13 aims to highlight the role of water resources in the extinction of vegetation
fires in protected or hardly accessible areas, as well as the specific methodology for
calculating the water resource available in periods of low humidity. The study area
is the Danube River, in the lower sector, more precisely Balta Mic˘ a a Br˘ ailei. This
wetland is a characteristic area of the Danube before its sinking into the Black Sea.
The research theme consisted of determining the characteristics of the water resource
in this hydrographic area, to be used in dry periods to extinguish potential plant fires.
Having thus organized a GIS database characteristic for the studied area, using the
ArcSwat application, there have been created layers representing: the basins and the
hydrographical network of this area, soil features, land-use characteristics, as well
as the land slopes. ArcSWAT, which is the GIS interface for SWAT, was used in
this study. ArcSWAT requires information on topography, soils, land use, slope categories, and weather data from the study region. Actual data was gathered to calibrate
and validate the SWAT for the study area, resulting in a series of specific maps. The
area is one that raises many challenges and problems in running the informational
application (low slopes of land and water, difficult determination of reception areas).
The research demonstrates the usefulness of GIS hydrological methods (in this case
ArcSWAT), in assessing the characteristics of the hydrological regime of the rivers.
The aggregation of hydrological information with other parameters leads to the identification of the optimal solutions to solving the tasks. Therefore, minimal anthropic
intervention on the environment, protection of water resources and the environment,
are objectives that lead to sustainable development of the current human society.
Chapter 14 shows mean diurnal cycles of various streamwater parameters in different catchments, river sections and time intervals in western and northern Romania.
The study area is located in the Romanian Carpathians, and the Moldavian Plateau
and 21 sites were used for measuring rivers. Water parameters used in this study are
temperature, electrical conductivity, and pressure/level. Air parameters are temperature, relative humidity, and atmospheric pressure. The studied time interval ranges
from 2011 to 2018 and is represented by compact measuring campaigns of a few
weeks or months of continuous monitoring. The measurements were done every 60,
30, 15 or 10 min, depending on site and campaign. Authors applied a detrending to
the time series, that was obtained by, firstly, calculating a relevant trend of the entire
time series through an additive seasonal decomposition which uses a period equal to
the length of a day and by, secondly, removing this trend from the raw time series.
The water monitoring sites have revealed similar diurnal shapes of the temperature,
level and electrical conductivity in areas with the natural flow: afternoon maximum
water level and temperature and minimum electrical conductivity; the opposite events
occur early in the morning. For both water and air parameters, the moments when
minima occur are less temporally variable than those of maxima, at all sites. To sum
up, chapter indicated that when using the detrended time series, the water temperature recorded diurnal cycles with amplitudes, ranging from 0.095 °C (site 21, S , ug˘ au
River) to 2.978 °C (site 5, Bobîlna River).
11
1.7 Case Studies
Chapter 13 aims to highlight the role of water resources in the extinction of vegetation
fires in protected or hardly accessible areas, as well as the specific methodology for
calculating the water resource available in periods of low humidity. The study area
is the Danube River, in the lower sector, more precisely Balta Mic˘ a a Br˘ ailei. This
wetland is a characteristic area of the Danube before its sinking into the Black Sea.
The research theme consisted of determining the characteristics of the water resource
in this hydrographic area, to be used in dry periods to extinguish potential plant fires.
Having thus organized a GIS database characteristic for the studied area, using the
ArcSwat application, there have been created layers representing: the basins and the
hydrographical network of this area, soil features, land-use characteristics, as well
as the land slopes. ArcSWAT, which is the GIS interface for SWAT, was used in
this study. ArcSWAT requires information on topography, soils, land use, slope categories, and weather data from the study region. Actual data was gathered to calibrate
and validate the SWAT for the study area, resulting in a series of specific maps. The
area is one that raises many challenges and problems in running the informational
application (low slopes of land and water, difficult determination of reception areas).
The research demonstrates the usefulness of GIS hydrological methods (in this case
ArcSWAT), in assessing the characteristics of the hydrological regime of the rivers.
The aggregation of hydrological information with other parameters leads to the identification of the optimal solutions to solving the tasks. Therefore, minimal anthropic
intervention on the environment, protection of water resources and the environment,
are objectives that lead to sustainable development of the current human society.
Chapter 14 shows mean diurnal cycles of various streamwater parameters in different catchments, river sections and time intervals in western and northern Romania.
The study area is located in the Romanian Carpathians, and the Moldavian Plateau
and 21 sites were used for measuring rivers. Water parameters used in this study are
temperature, electrical conductivity, and pressure/level. Air parameters are temperature, relative humidity, and atmospheric pressure. The studied time interval ranges
from 2011 to 2018 and is represented by compact measuring campaigns of a few
weeks or months of continuous monitoring. The measurements were done every 60,
30, 15 or 10 min, depending on site and campaign. Authors applied a detrending to
the time series, that was obtained by, firstly, calculating a relevant trend of the entire
time series through an additive seasonal decomposition which uses a period equal to
the length of a day and by, secondly, removing this trend from the raw time series.
The water monitoring sites have revealed similar diurnal shapes of the temperature,
level and electrical conductivity in areas with the natural flow: afternoon maximum
water level and temperature and minimum electrical conductivity; the opposite events
occur early in the morning. For both water and air parameters, the moments when
minima occur are less temporally variable than those of maxima, at all sites. To sum
up, chapter indicated that when using the detrended time series, the water temperature recorded diurnal cycles with amplitudes, ranging from 0.095 °C (site 21, S , ug˘ au
River) to 2.978 °C (site 5, Bobîlna River).