Rivers and waste management
Today climate change, global warming and pollution are factors that threaten the existence of man or at least his effective involvement for development and growth.
Water is essential to man’s survival and the rest of the ecosystem. In a country like India, many states are blessed with the presence of rivers that flow through them on their way to the sea.
Today we have many organizations (governmental, NGOs and private) taking up issues that are affecting our river systems.
There have been many surveys, reports and action plans authored to protect our rivers. The Clean Ganga Action Plan is one that needs mention as it deals with effort to identify causes, stop or control and cleanse the river Ganga.
1. Urban landscape around rivers and riverbanks: The urban landscape around rivers and riverbanks has grown over the years and today includes residential complexes, commercial establishments, industry elements and roads that are used by commuters to commute within regions.
Man has not been very well planned in his endeavors of urbanization and modernization. He has encroached shorelines, the land forming perimeters for riverbanks and has even polluted stretches of rivers that flow in close proximity to rural and urban landscapes. The extent of this negative influence on rivers is that significant that it has affected the purposefulness of rivers and balance in their river systems.
This has not only affected the quality of water but also affected the aquatic life, flora, fauna, vegetation cover and other ecosystems that have evolved due to the course taken by the river on its way to the sea.
This contamination has also affected the fertility and naturally enriched soil in and around the rivers. Most importantly all this has caused an imbalance that shows up in the form of extremities such as periodic or unforeseen flooding to drying up of stretches of rivers leading to a deficit in the availability of water to states or regions that have and still depend upon them. The river Ganga for one has been most polluted by man due to dumping of industrial waste, discharge of untreated waste & effluents, redirecting of sewage and even due to the use of the river for religious purposes that extend from festivities to last rites.
Rivers such as the Ganga stretch across a distance of approximately 2500 km, where the terrain through which the river flows varies from nature-in-its-most-pristine form, to thickly populated regions and even ones where industries function.
This makes it difficult to control and reduce the pollutants being discharged into the river. As the endeavor to control river pollution is an after step, we need to not only plan for mitigation or cleansing, but also control the damage being done and take preventive steps to stop any further deterioration due to uncontrolled influences.
2. Need of the hour It may not be possible to clean our rivers (completely) today or for that matter worse so at later stages, if we do not review the need to control waste management and take remedial action. Developing programmes like the Clean Ganga Action Plan may not be as feasible or as well formulated due to the diversities in the river systems of the different rivers.
According to this article, every river and its river system does need a river management programme that is closely associated with its journey right from the headwaters to the sea. The reader can refer to an Appendix to understand the journey of a river.
The river management programmes can be based on simple content management systems that monitor and report data about a river during its journey to the sea. The data available along with Point Slope interception can control the waste footprint of habitats, pockets of industrial activities and landscapes close to rivers, and thereon help protect our rivers.
We need to look beyond the current problems affecting certain rivers to develop a sustainable action plan to control pollution of rivers, streams, lakes, ponds and wells that work in an interconnected manner in the lifecycle of a river.
We need to think past the environment management standards like the ISO 14000 that by large helps industries and businesses control their waste generation and management. We need to develop a Point Slope interception action plan and implementation that can be deployed in rural & urban landscapes and regions of industrial activities that are on shorelines, on riverbanks or for that matter close to rivers and their interconnected water bodies. The report refers all such waste producing entities as sites. 3. Progressive and remedial steps that can be taken by large: We can start using Math power to control wastage. This Math Power could incorporate a concept called Point Slope Interception to understand the waste generated by a producer or consumer site over a period of time. The period of time could be decided based on any Critical Path Management seen necessary for such circuits. The report refers to all routes or locations generating waste as circuits.
This insight could help us plan “responsiveness” in circuits close to rivers or in regions where there are water bodies that are part of an interconnected river system. Tomorrow climate change and global warming could lead to flood like situations where this could lead to ground water or river water contamination.
In effect, this could require better waste segregation and waste disposal programmes as waste collected from producers or consumers generally makes its way to a dumpsite or landfill, which is open to impact that can be caused by untimely heavy rainfall or flooding of interconnected water bodies like lakes, ponds, wells and even storm water drains.
Raising hopes that all of such issues can be mitigated by a cleansing programme, may be an oversight. Today the need to use math power like monitoring the weight of waste collected from a site (according to a biodegradable category and categories of non-biodegradable waste) may be a simple logistic measure.
Additionally existing waste management solutions are not as yet structured to permit a secure contact organization to control orchestration of steps & practices, know-how and responsiveness expected from a site.
This secure contact organization could use Point Slope Interception assessments to raise questions and concerns based on baseline aspects like a. Emergent impact of the waste being generated on health or wellness (termed as pathogenic lifecycles of the waste itself) b. Emergent impact of the waste being generated on ground water tables or water bodies (in case of seepage and overflows) c. Emergent impact if there is a bulk increase in waste being generated, when this is not expected in the circuit as it raises dump site issues (termed as remedial action to be taken when there is a change in the amount of waste being generated) d. Lack of the responsiveness shown by a (non-industrial category) producer or consumer in controlling waste being generated (that is segregating, collecting, as possible treating and thereon disposing), termed as Point Slope responsiveness to control what is possible e. Lack of any necessary Corporate Social Responsibility to be shown by an industrial category producer or connected consumers to control waste being generated (that is segregate, collect, compulsorily treat and thereafter dispose), termed as CSR responsiveness to stabilize waste footprint reduction life cycles f. Emergent impact if people living close to the river and its inter-connected bodies violate norms and dump waste directly. This issue will need a team monitoring a water body (like stretches of a river, stream and for that matter lakes, ponds, wells) to incorporate methodologies to also report its Point Slope Interception details to a secure organization from time to time. This can ensure proactive thinking and remedial action.
Point Slope Interception.
In the field of mathematics, ones uses a concept called Point Slope form to find the slope of a line passing through two distinct points drawn with reference to a X and Y axis.
In this insight to control waste footprints, the Point Slope form concept is used to plot the graph of waste (in kg as per a specific category) collected from a site on a periodic basis (where this could be diurnal, daily, weekly, fortnightly etc). The graph is plotted with time (as dates in the dd-mm-yyyy format) on the X-axis and the weight of waste collected (in kg) on the Y-axis.
The trend and slope of the graph will thereon be helpful in scenarios where a secure contact organization functions to review the waste footprint of a site in order to assess, report or orchestrate (in close coordination) responsiveness.
Responsiveness could mean controlling the amount of non-biodegradable waste by either going in for the 4Rs (Reduce, Recycle, Reuse and Renew) or by treating the waste or by using biodegradable alternatives. Acceptable graphs of the adequate responsiveness of a site will show minimal or controlled changes in the slope of the line joining 2 points in the Point Slope Interception graph.
4. Further steps - Induction via a Community center
A Community Center can be exclusively setup to induct involvement in people or organizations to use math power to control wastage.
The Community Center can also transition different levels of information to people or organizations on a continual basis where the need to use new “orchestrations” / “approaches”, new Logistics control, and new Quadrant control for specific categorizations and thus reduce the number of scale & scope related transitions.
The Community Center could also rely on the services of a R&D department to identify measures that can be taken to remove or clean categories of pollutants, or even neutralize toxins, poisons and microbes that may contaminate a water body.
An expert panel could be setup for the Slope Point Interception Programme and river management programme to help ensure adequate thinking, actions planning and steering. The expert panel could include staff from the following departments and more suitable areas: a. Meteorology & Geology departments b. Tribunals, state governments and other rural & urban governing bodies c. Water supply and sanitation departments d. Chemical engineering departments e. Public health departments f. NGOs and other volunteering organizations (that are helping hands)
5. Conclusion: River systems need man’s use of design principles and advanced SMART technology. Addressing will help survival, development and growth amidst imbalances that have set in. Understanding this may mitigate threats that exist and are still emerging.
Appendix A. Understanding a river system:
River systems collect surface water and channel it back to the sea, to a delta, to a lake, to an open terrain. A river system includes the main channel and all the tributaries that flow into it. Water in rivers mainly comes up from rain, melted water from snow and ice. Rainwater on impermeable ground collects in streams. Rainwater on permeable ground sinks in and emerges as springs. Both of these natural phenomena contribute to the water that enters a river. The area surrounding a river and its tributaries is called a drainage basin. Drainage basins are very important in the life cycle of a river as it flows back into the sea. Rivers can be of two categories that is (1) Perennial rivers that flow all through the year and (2) Seasonal rivers that come alive during the monsoons and mostly dry up or report very less water in the summer and dry seasons.
To respond constructively to a river system, we need to understand its flow right from the source to the mouth of the sea. B. From the source to the mouth
1. Understanding the behavior of water
Water under the influence of gravity finds the shortest route downhill. Whenever it meets weaknesses in the underlying landforms or rocks it cuts down to form waterfalls, gorges and valleys. When a river reaches a flatter ground it slows down. Some rivers flow in wide, curving meanders as they cross flood plains.
2. Understanding the journey of the river
a. Source – The area where different sources of the river come together to form a single flow. This is called head water. b. Upper reaches – The current in this part of the river is strong, and the river cuts channels through exposed soft rock. c. Lower reaches – On lower flatter ground, the river’s flow slows down. As it flows through flood plains it meanders. Loops and oxbow lakes are formed when the river meanders through the flood plains. d. Mouth – Here the river discharges into a sea or a lake. Sometimes a delta is formed when the river’s flow is checked as it meets the sea. In this condition the river deposits its sediment load at the river mouth. There are two main types of deltas, that is the fan delta and the bird’s foot delta. Estuaries form where there are depressions around or where there are barriers across river mouths. Deltas, estuaries and flood plains support a diverse variety of wetlands, which are traditional zones between river environments and dry land. The wetlands include marshes, swamps and flood plain forests.
Role of wetlands:
Wetlands play a vital role in flood control. Wetlands act like sponges that absorb and store rainwater and then release it slowly thus reducing peak flood levels. Wetland vegetation help stabilize riverbanks and shorelines.
C. References: a. Reader’s Digest “Knowledge Quest” b. Essential Reference World Atlas c. Enterprise content management (ECM) d. Corresponding report on “Responding to a river system”