Tamim Younos

A study of environmentally relevant behavior in university residence halls

Purpose – This paper aims to report on a study promoting energy conservation on Virginia Techs campus. It explores whether the behavior of students living in university residence halls would change when various electricity conservation strategies are introduced.Design/methodology/approach – Intervention strategies, including educational media, information, and voluntary resource‐conservation activities, were applied at varying levels of intensity across five study groups over two semesters in 2009. Additional questions explore whether one particular strategy would produce higher consumption reductions, and whether combining strategies would produce more consumption reductions than individual techniques.Findings – The findings revealed that on a campus where environmentally sustainability is foremost in the minds of students and administration, asking students to take action to reduce their consumption resulted in positive consumption reductions, even in the control group. Additive strategies did not prod...

Sustainable Water Management in Urban Environments

Today, more than half of the world’s population is living in cities that are often centres of production, prosperity and development, but when it comes to handling water in urban areas, a number of challenges exist related to providing safe and efficient solutions to urban water issues. Challenges urban water managers face include flooding and extreme weather events, which will increase in severity because of climate change. Cities located in coastal and delta areas already face the risk of increased flooding and other extreme events, which climate change will further aggravate. In Denmark, the Ministry of the Environment envisages that a sea level rise of 0.7 m on average will lead to increased flooding similar to a 400-year event taking place every 1–2 years; thus, cities must do their utmost to improve climate change resilience. Introducing integrated urban water management (IUWM) as a concept for planning to improve water management by linking different elements such as spatial planning, stormwater management and urban environment provides a more holistic input to planning. In this chapter, we examine definitions of IUWM and global experiences. Furthermore, we look at experienced barriers to moving towards more integrated water management and a number of solutions in order to overcome the barriers to integrated approaches. Finally, we describe how solutions based on innovative and integrated approaches are efficient and contribute to improved water management even though not every single element of urban water management can be a part of integrated solutions.

Advances in Watershed Science and Assessment

This volume offers concepts, methods and case studies of innovative and evolving technologies in the area of watershed assessment. Topics discussed include: (1) Development and applications of geospatial, satellite imagery and remote sensing technologies for land monitoring; (2) Development and applications of satellite imagery for monitoring inland water quality; (3) Development and applications of water sensor technologies for real-time monitoring of water quantity and quality; and (4) Advances in biological monitoring and microbial source tracking technologies.This book will be of interest to graduate students and researchers involved in watershed science and environmental studies. Equally, it will serve as a valuable guide to experts in government agencies who are concerned with water-availability and water-quality issues, and engineers and other professionals involved in the design of land- and water-monitoring systems.

Twenty-first century urban water management: the imperative for holistic and cross-disciplinary approach

A symbiotic relationship exists between simultaneous urban development and population growth. Consequences of this relationship have caused deterioration of natural water resources and a continuous need for expansion of urban water infrastructure. In this article, authors discuss the impact of accelerated urbanization on water resources in the twentieth century and the imperatives for holistic and cross-disciplinary approach in water management to meet the twenty-first century quality of life goals. Impediments to futuristic urban water management are also discussed.