Risks of Future Droughts and their Impacts on Scottish Private Water Supplies

In recent years, Scotland has been experiencing lower-than-average rainfall in the spring and summer seasons leading to water scarcity in many parts of the country, especially during the summer months. Climate change is likely to exacerbate these dry conditions even more in the future, presenting significant risks to water resources management. Businesses and households, especially those relying on Private Water Supplies (PWS) in rural areas, such as boreholes and springs, have already observed noticeable changes in the quantity and quality of water during the dry periods. Around 3.5% of the Scottish population relies on PWS which includes households, industries, agriculture, and the tourism industry. This study aims to project future drier periods from 2041-2080 across Scotland on a 1-km grid, using the Standardised Precipitation and Evapotranspiration Index and the observed meteorological data from 1981-2020 as the baseline. Results suggest low to extreme drought conditions in all 1-km cells , with increases in dry conditions likely to be highest in the eastern parts of Scotland, showing a distinct spatial variability in drought characteristics across Scotland. In future work, past and future drought occurrences will be linked with the water quality characteristics of PWS to understand the likely impact of future droughts on Scotland’s water security. The water quality dataset has been made available from the Drinking Water Quality Regulator for Scotland for the period 2006-2020 for nearly 6000 PWS locations. These PWS have been monitored twice a year on an average for their water quality. They span across 25 administrative areas in Scotland and represent roughly 27% of the total PWS in Scotland. Water quality variables such as faecal coliforms, E.coli, iron, turbidity, lead, pH, colour, nitrate and phosphate will be included in the analysis to facilitate planning for effective, resilient water resources management and ensure access to clean water to maintain health and livelihoods

Gestión municipal y desarrollo local: bases para el planeamiento estratégico en la municipalidad del distrito de Ate Vitarte 2008 - 2015

En La presente investigación, el objetivo esencial, es determinar la relación entre “gestión municipal y desarrollo local: bases para el planeamiento estratégico de la municipalidad del distrito de ate vitarte 2008 - 2015“. Se trata de un estudio, de carácter analítico, descriptivo y exploratorio, manejando un diseño transversal, valiéndose de un cuestionario manejando una muestra de 178 Dirigentes de Base, rescatados de la población total de 330 dirigentes. (personal directivo, personal jerárquico, personal técnico y colaboradores en general; compenetrados con la gestión municipal y, por ende, con el desarrollo local). Los resultados indican, que el modelo de desarrollo, en base a la gestión, tienen significativa relación con el desarrollo local, ya que los dirigentes tienen un promedio de edad (37.7 años) y, por ende, están en una edad productiva, respecto de la pea y se observa una relación en la cual se observa 80 hombres por cada 100 mujeres, (hablando de personas con 14 años de edad), manteniendo un nivel de educación promedio de tercer año de secundaria. Hablando de los dirigentes de base, la gestión municipal la califican de regular a pésima, respecto de la municipalidad del distrito de ate. vitarte, lo cual también se observa las finanzas municipales, manteniendo relaciones directas y significativas, de la mano del desarrollo local, a un 95% de confianza y con un 5% de probabilidad de error. En cuanto a los niveles de apatía, los dirigentes califican la gestión, en un nivel del 41% y a la vez, perciben corrupción, falta de transparencia y falta de gobernabilidad, respecto del desarrollo local, con una la participación del 17%, destacando la indiferencia a los problemas locales, en un nivel del 42%

Efectos de las estrategias de comercialización en la competitividad de medianas empresas textileras en Lima Metropolitana

La presente tesis tiene como objetivo general determinar los efectos de las estrategias de comercialización en la competitividad de medianas empresas textileras en Lima Metropolitana. El primer objetivo específico, precisa en verificar si el mercado influye en la calidad de las medianas empresas textileras en Lima Metropolitana. Como segundo objetivo específico, es analizar si la mezcla comercial influye en la productividad de las medianas empresas textileras en Lima Metropolitana. El tercer objetivo específico, determinar si el cliente influye en los costos de las medianas empresas textileras en Lima Metropolitana. Durante el proceso de la investigación, se consultó bibliografía relacionada con las estrategias de comercialización en la competitividad de medianas empresas textileras, estudios y experiencias, estableciendo el marco teórico que traza las pautas para contrastar los resultados de la investigación. Con los estudios y el análisis de los resultados de las entrevistas, las encuestas y las experiencias, fue posible determinar cómo las estrategias de comercialización y los mecanismos de gestión mejoran la competitividad y propician la mejora continua en las medianas empresas textileras

Risks of Future Droughts and their Impacts on Scottish Private Water Supplies

In recent years, Scotland has been experiencing lower-than-average rainfall in the spring and summer seasons leading to water scarcity in many parts of the country, especially during the summer months. Climate change is likely to exacerbate these dry conditions even more in the future, presenting significant risks to water resources management. Businesses and households, especially those relying on Private Water Supplies (PWS) in rural areas, such as boreholes and springs, have already observed noticeable changes in the quantity and quality of water during the dry periods. Around 3.5% of the Scottish population relies on PWS which includes households, industries, agriculture, and the tourism industry. This study aims to project future drier periods from 2041-2080 across Scotland on a 1-km grid, using the Standardised Precipitation and Evapotranspiration Index and the observed meteorological data from 1981-2020 as the baseline. Results suggest low to extreme drought conditions in all 1-km cells , with increases in dry conditions likely to be highest in the eastern parts of Scotland, showing a distinct spatial variability in drought characteristics across Scotland. In future work, past and future drought occurrences will be linked with the water quality characteristics of PWS to understand the likely impact of future droughts on Scotland’s water security. The water quality dataset has been made available from the Drinking Water Quality Regulator for Scotland for the period 2006-2020 for nearly 6000 PWS locations. These PWS have been monitored twice a year on an average for their water quality. They span across 25 administrative areas in Scotland and represent roughly 27% of the total PWS in Scotland. Water quality variables such as faecal coliforms, E.coli, iron, turbidity, lead, pH, colour, nitrate and phosphate will be included in the analysis to facilitate planning for effective, resilient water resources management and ensure access to clean water to maintain health and livelihoods

Evaluating an Ecosystem Management Approach for Improving Water Quality on the Holnicote Estate, Exmoor

The European Water Framework Directive 2000 established a new emphasis for the management of freshwaters by setting ecologically-based water quality targets that are to be achieved through holistic, catchment-scale, ecosystem management. However, significant knowledge gaps exist in the understanding of the cumulative effectiveness of multiple mitigation measures on a number of pollutants at a catchment scale. This research contributes to improved understanding of the effectiveness of an ecosystem management approach to deliver catchment-scale water quality improvements on the National Trust Holnicote Estate on Exmoor, UK. This research is part of a larger multi-objective project funded by the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), to demonstrate the benefits of land use interventions for the management of flood risk. This thesis evaluates the effects of upland ditch blocking on physico-chemical and biological parameters of water quality in an upland Horner Water catchment one year after habitat restoration, and establishes a solid baseline for the monitoring of the effects of current and future land management changes in a lowland, intensively managed, agricultural Aller catchment. The spatial variability of soil physical and chemical properties (bulk density, total carbon (TN), nitrogen (TN), C:N ratio, δ15N, total phosphorus (TP), inorganic phosphorus (IP), organic phosphorus (OP)) and water quality determinands (suspended sediment (SS), dissolved organic carbon (DOC), total particulate carbon (TPC), total oxidised nitrogen (TON) and dissolved reactive phosphorus (DRP)) in the two study catchments with contrasting land use has been characterised and linked to the prevailing land use. Agricultural land use resulted in extensive homogenisation of soil properties. The spatial dependence of all soil properties, except for bulk density and δ15N, was stronger in the agricultural than the semi-natural catchment (nugget:sill ratio 0.10-0.42 in the Aller and 0.15-0.94 in Horner Water), while bulk density, TP, inorganic phosphorus (IP), organic phosphorus (OP), C:N ratio, δ15N and carbon storage showed a longer range of spatial auto-correlation in the agricultural catchment (2,807-3,191 m in the Aller and 545-2,599 m Horner Water). The central tendency (mean, median) of all soil properties, except for IP and δ15N, also differed significantly between the two catchments (P < 0.01). The observed extensive alteration of soil physical and chemical properties in the agricultural catchment is likely to have long-term implications for the restoration of ecosystem functioning and water quality management. The intensive land use seems to have resulted in an altered ‘catchment metabolism’, manifested in a proportionally greater total fluvial carbon (dissolved and particulate) export from the agricultural than the semi-natural catchment. The agricultural catchment supported significantly higher DOC concentrations (P < 0.05) and the quality of DOC differed markedly between the two study catchments. The prevalence of more humic, higher molecular weight compounds in the agricultural catchment and simpler, lower molecular weight compounds in the semi-natural catchment, indicated enhanced microbial turnover of fluvial DOC in the agricultural catchment as well as additional allochtonous terrestrial sources. During an eight month period for which a comparable continuous turbidity record was available, the estimated SS yields from the agricultural catchment (25.5-116.2 t km2) were higher than from the semi-natural catchment (21.7-57.8 t km2). Further, the agricultural catchment exported proportionally more TPC (0.51-2.59 kg mm-1) than the semi-natural catchment (0.36-0.97 kg mm-1) and a similar amount of DOC (0.26-0.52 kg mm-1 in the Aller and 0.24-0.32 kg mm-1 in Horner Water), when normalised by catchment area and total discharge, despite the lower total soil carbon pool, thus indicating an enhanced fluvial loss of sediment and carbon from the intensively managed catchment. Whilst detection of catchment-scale effects of mitigation measures typically requires high resolution, resource-intensive, long term data sets, this research has found that simple approaches can be effective in bridging the gap between fine scale ecosystem functioning and catchment-scale processes. Here, the new macro-invertebrate index PSI (Proportion of Sediment-sensitive Invertebrates) has been shown to be more closely related to a physical measure of sedimentation (% fine bed sediment cover) (P = 0.002) than existing non-pressure specific macro-invertebrate metrics such as the Lotic Index for Flow Evaluation (LIFE) and % Ephemeroptera, Plecoptera & Trichoptera abundance (% EPT) (P = 0.014). Further testing of PSI along a pronounced environmental gradient is recommended as PSI and % fine bed sediment cover have the potential to become a sensitive tool for the setting and monitoring of twin sedimentation targets. Upland ditch management has not had any discernible effect on water quality in the semi-natural upland catchment one year after restoration, which may be due to the short-term post-restoration monitoring period but may also reflect benign effects of large-scale earth moving works on this high quality environment. The conceptual understanding of catchment processes developed in this thesis suggests that cumulatively, the recently completed mitigation works in the lowland agricultural catchment will likely result in reduced sediment and nutrient input into the aquatic environment. However, further research is needed to build on this detailed baseline characterisation and inform the understanding of the effectiveness of combined mitigation measures to reduce the flux of multiple contaminants at the catchment scale.The National TrustUK Environment Agenc

Uplandia: making better policy in complex upland systems. Final report.

This project developed a Bayesian Belief Network for English uplands, representing key system components and relationships on the basis of the best available evidence. Given the policy relevance of managed and wild fire, a rapid evidence synthesis was conducted to assess factors influencing the behaviour of peatland users and managers in relation to wildfire, which informed a wildfire sub-model. By considering four scenarios, it was possible to consider how changes in the availability of public funding and/or carbon finance might alter the overall utility of uplands and provision of ecosystem services. users and managers in relation to wildfire, which informed a wildfire sub- model. By considering four scenarios (below), it was possible to consider how changes in the availability of public funding and/or carbon finance might alter the overall utility of uplands and provision of specific ecosystem services. users and managers in relation to wildfire, which informed a wildfire sub- model. By considering four scenarios (below), it was possible to consider how changes in the availability of public funding and/or carbon finance might alter the overall utility of uplands and provision of specific ecosystem services. users and managers in relation to wildfire, which informed a wildfire sub- model. By considering four scenarios (below), it was possible to consider how changes in the availability of public funding and/or carbon finance might alter the overall utility of uplands and provision of specific ecosystem services