Modeling fecal coliform contamination in a tidal Danshuei River estuarine system

• Published in: The Science of the total environment Vol. 502; pp. 632 - 640
• Main Authors: Liu, Wen-Cheng, Chan, Wen-Ting, Young, Chih-Chieh
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Netherlands Elsevier B.V 01.01.2015
• Subjects: Contamination; Discharge; Enterobacteriaceae - growth & development; Environmental Monitoring - methods; Estuarine environments; Fecal coliform contamination; Freshwater discharge; Freshwaters; Models, Theoretical; Numerical modeling; Reduction; Rivers; Rivers - microbiology; Salinity; SELFE-FC; Streams; Taiwan; Tidal estuarine system; Water Microbiology; Water Movements; Water Pollution - statistics & numerical data; Water quality; Taiwan; ISEW, Taiwan; Taiwan, Keelung R; Numerical modeling; Fecal coliform contamination; SELFE-FC; Tidal estuarine system; Freshwater discharge; Salinity
• ISSN: 0048-9697; 1879-1026
• DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2014.09.065

A three-dimensional fecal coliform transport model was developed and incorporated into a hydrodynamic model to obtain a better understanding of local microbiological water quality in the tidal Danshuei River estuarine system of northern Taiwan. The model was firstly validated with the salinity and fecal coliform data measured in 2010. The concentration comparison showed quantitatively good agreement between the simulation and measurement results. Further, the model was applied to investigate the effects of upstream freshwater discharge variation and fecal coliform loading reduction on the contamination distributions in the tidal estuarine system. The qualitative and quantitative analyses clearly revealed that low freshwater discharge resulted in higher fecal coliform concentration. The fecal coliform loading reduction considerably decreased the contamination along the Danshuei River–Tahan Stream, the Hsintien Stream, and the Keelung River. •A three-dimensional hydrodynamic and fecal coliform model was developed.•The contamination of fecal coliform in a tidal estuarine system was investigated.•Freshwater discharge plays an important role on fecal coliform distribution in an estuarine system.•Loading reduction is an effective strategy to reduce fecal coliform concentration.