StudentShare
Contact Us
Sign In / Sign Up for FREE
Search
Go to advanced search...
Free

Urban Water Cycle - Essay Example

Cite this document
Summary
The essay "Urban Water Cycle" describes that the urban water cycle involves the movement of water across several channels. The quality of water determines the health of humans that use it from the catchment area. As a result, care is fundamental when safeguarding and conserving catchment areas. …
Download full paper File format: .doc, available for editing
GRAB THE BEST PAPER91.6% of users find it useful
Urban Water Cycle
Read Text Preview

Extract of sample "Urban Water Cycle"

Task: Water Cycle and Urban Water Cycle Natural Water Cycle The water within the earth is always in constant motion. This motion involves several processes that form the water cycle. Apparently, water cycle is the description of the continuous water movement within, below or above the earth’s surface. It is called hydrological cycle. This movement of water involves a change in the physical state between vapor, ice and liquid. The main driving force responsible for the circulation of water is heat. Heat is exchanged within resultant temperature changes. The sun is the main source of heat that enhances the water cycle. As it heats the ocean and seawaters, evaporation takes place leading to loss of water to the air. This water meets the rising air currents that take it up through vapor into the environment. While in the atmosphere, the cooler temperatures condense the vapor to form clouds (Kalman and Sjonger 17). The air currents circulate the water vapor around the earth. As this movement takes place, the particles in the cloud keep on colliding with each other and grow. Eventually, the vapor rises to the upper most part of the atmosphere before it begins to fall in layers of precipitation. Some precipitation falls in form of snow, sleet or hails that accumulate to form glaciers and ice caps. Snow and ice sometimes sublime to form water vapor directly. A higher percentage of precipitation falls back into seas, oceans and land as rains. Those that fall on land flow either through surface runoffs back into rivers, lakes, oceans and seas or sink into the ground to form groundwater. Groundwater helps to replenish aquifers. Through openings in the surface of the land, some ground water rises up as freshwater in springs. These natural ways allows water to circulate the globe. Water then flows into rivers and oceans from where evaporation takes place (Morgan 31). Urban Water Cycle The circulation of water assumes an almost similar process as the natural water cycle within an urban setting. However, the urban water cycle is massively under the influence of human interventions. The urban water cycle is simply the description of the distance that a drop of water travels from the point of collection for urban use to the point of return to the natural water cycle. Most traditional sources of water in urban centers are diminishing especially through availability and supply. This requires increased investments in integrated water management systems to improve sustainability measures (Tong 21). The availability of reliable fresh water supply in urban centers is an essential requirement to all human beings. Traditionally, every village in many civilizations had water wells that allowed residents to fetch water for domestic and agricultural use. The collection of water from the well was done through buckets and urns. Thereafter, the water was manually carried to houses for use. Later on, the Romans considered the use of canals to pipe in water from the wells into some specific buildings for use. They also built drains to convey wastewaters from the buildings. Due to this design, diseases and epidemics such as cholera and typhoid as the rest of the world did not attack the Romans. This idea by the Romans formed the genesis for urban water circulation. The Industrial Revolution period was a good turning point as people learned new methodologies of supplying water in large quantities to emerging cities and towns. Moreover, the improvement of scientific and medical knowledge in modern times has helped facilitate the supply and provision of clean and safe water to cities and towns. It has also helped address the problems of wastewater disposal. These kinds of developments have resulted into the creation of manmade water cycle, otherwise known as urban water cycle. The urban water cycle involves the collection of water from its naturally occurring or flowing location, its treatment, use, disposal, the sewerage treatment and releasing of the treated sewerage back into the natural water cycle (Hlavinek, Kukharchyk and Marsalek 45). Most urban centers receive their supply of water from a definite water entity such as a river, lake or a dam. The land area that surrounds the water source is its catchment. The level of cleanliness of a catchment area determines the water quality of the dam or river. A town that uses a dam or several dams as water reservoirs will receive water from rivers. In this regard, the state of the river will determine the water quality that enters the dam. The dam is the storage point for the water from rivers. It is normally built adjacent to a river to block a section of the flowing water and store it. It is from the dam that the urban population receive reliable water supply for their use. Although the water in the dam might look clear, it is not fit for human consumption yet. This is because it contains pollen, soil particles and dust. These particles contain viruses, bacteria together with several other microorganisms that can be harmful to human health. To remove these microorganisms, the water from the dam is first processed in a water treatment plant prior to its use. The water goes through some specific stages and steps at the treatment plant. Such stages include pre treatment, flocculation, filtration and chemical dosing. At the pre treatment level, a polymer called coagulant and alum is added to the water. The substances help to capture the solid particles that provide host to bacteria and viruses. The water free of the particles remains less turbid and clean. At the flocculation level, there is the removal of solid particle from the water. Mixing and circulation occurs for the solid particles captured in the pre treatment step to float on top in the form of froth. At the filtration level, the water is pumped through filters to get rid of the remaining particles. Finally, there is the addition of chlorine to get rid of the remaining microorganisms or germs, if any at the chemical dosing stage. This stage also involves the addition of fluorine for teeth protection and the adjustment of the pH level of the water. After the above stages of treatment, the bulk main pipes supply carries the treated water to reservoirs allowing its distribution into smaller pipes into households. The reservoirs help the water stored to adjust with the changing demands. It also assists in the management of the pressure from users so that it flows to taps at expected speeds. Reservoirs can be either above or below the ground. The reservoirs supply water into homes through the service lines than branch from the mains pipe. After use at home, the water goes down the drain from where it enters the network of wastewater. The wastewater then flows into the sewerage system. The sewerage system consists of a network of pipes that conveys sewage off businesses and the household. These pipes relay the sewage to a sewage treatment plant for treatment and safe recycle. The sewage, being mostly water will flow in the sewage system by the force of gravity. The treatment of the sewage involves the summation of complex processes that aims to get rid of toxic and poisonous substances. The solid particles then are separated from the particles of water. Cleaning and releasing of the remaining water is into the natural cycle occurs. Several sewage treatment approaches in the world exist. The natural water cycle is where water flows through an existing system known as the water cycle. In this cycle, water continuously moves between the land, atmosphere and the oceans (Karamouz, Moridi and Nazif 34). Conclusion The urban water cycle involves the movement of water across several channels. The quality of water determines the health of humans that use it from the catchment area. As a result, care is fundamental when safeguarding and conserving catchment areas. This involves avoiding such activities as farming, deforestation and the use of pesticides on farms. This is because the chemicals finally find their way into the dam. Additionally, the sewer waters need mandatory treatments before release into the natural water cycles for the good health of the environment. Works Cited Hlavinek, Petr et al. Integrated Urban Water Resources Management. Dordrecht: Springer, 2006. Print. Kalman, Bobbie and Rebecca Sjonger. The Water Cycle. New York: Crabtree Publishing Company, 2006. Print. Karamouz, Mohammad, Ali Moridi and Sara Nazif. Urban Water Engineering and Management. Boca Raton, Fla.: CRC PressINC, 2010. Print. Morgan, Sally. QR code for The Water Cycle. New York: The Rosen Publishing Group, 2009. Print. Tong, T H. Application of a Total Urban Water Cycle Model to Develop Urban Water Management Strategies for Tel Aviv, Israel, Water Balance and Energy Consequences. Delft: Unesco-IHE, 2009. Print. Read More
Cite this document
  • APA
  • MLA
  • CHICAGO
(“Urban Water Cycle Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words - 1”, n.d.)
Urban Water Cycle Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words - 1. Retrieved from https://studentshare.org/environmental-studies/1609110-water-cycle-and-urban-water-cycle
(Urban Water Cycle Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 Words - 1)
Urban Water Cycle Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 Words - 1. https://studentshare.org/environmental-studies/1609110-water-cycle-and-urban-water-cycle.
“Urban Water Cycle Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 Words - 1”, n.d. https://studentshare.org/environmental-studies/1609110-water-cycle-and-urban-water-cycle.
  • Cited: 0 times

CHECK THESE SAMPLES OF Urban Water Cycle

Storm Water Management

Some of the impacts of the development on hydrological cycle include increased peak discharges of runoff compared to pre-development levels, Increased volume of runoff formed by each storm in comparison to the pre-development situation, decreased time in which runoff reaches the stream, chiefly if extensive drainage changes are made.... The soil has a limited ability to absorb or soak water, so the water that is left on the surface after absorption is carried away by the slopes on roads into the drainage that is the sewers or directly… The water that is left on the surface is called surface runoff....
3 Pages (750 words) Assignment

Standard drive cycle recreation from general driving behaviour

In many parts of the world car manufacturers are required by law to state the fuel economy performance of their vehicles when undertaking one or more Standard Drive Cycles such as the Urban and Extra Urban test cycle definitions required in Western Europe.... This paper documents the early stages of a research project which aims to segment the Standard Drive cycle definitions into a series of operating characteristic windows which can then be searched for and automatically extracted from general driving behaviour of a car on the road, and thereafter concatenated to re-creating a real-world equivalent of the Standard Drive cycle without the need for rolling road or laboratory testing....
4 Pages (1000 words) Essay

Water droplet/particle as it travels through the water cycle & urban water cycle

This is an excursion of water from gathering in forested catchments from coming back to the characteristic water cycle as dirty wastewater which gets be known as the Urban Water Cycle.... It is unique in relation to the regular water cycle because of people involved in taking the… Contrary to Urban Water Cycle, the water cycle or hydrologic is a constant cycle where water evaporates, goes into the air and becomes a cloud, precipitates, and afterward dissipates as rain once more....
5 Pages (1250 words) Essay

Water Cycle

The earth depends on the water cycle to support life.... The vapor is taken up into the atmosphere and as it rises into water cycle affiliation water cycle water cycle or hydrologic cycle is the process where water moves above, on and in the surface.... The earth depends on the water cycle to support life.... The water cycle does not have any starting point, but the process begins where a large body of water exists like an ocean....
2 Pages (500 words) Assignment

Development of Mathematical Model to Calculate Fuel Consumption of Passenger Cars

hellip; The New European Drive cycle (NEDC) has been utilized as the testing framework to derive the mathematical relationship between fuel consumption and measurable driving parameters.... A few driving phases were identified so that any drive cycle may be composed of these phases; and mathematical relationships have been fitted on measured data for each of the phases....
13 Pages (3250 words) Article

The Particle as It Travels through the Water Cycles

The warm wind rising from the surface of the earth takes the water droplet higher, where the temperature of the wind is much cooler(Natural water cycle).... It may fall on the leaf of the tree from where it may be headed towards the cloud for being a part of the water cycle again.... The natural water cycle is considered to be important for life on earth and is taking place for billions of years.... It is a fact that the water we consume today has also been used by dinosaurs millions of years ago but yet it has been cleaned many times since then(The water cycle)....
5 Pages (1250 words) Essay

Impacts of Human Activities on the Water Cycle at Local and Global Levels

… The paper " Impacts of Human Activities on the water cycle at Local and Global Levels " is a great example of a literature review on environmental studies.... The paper " Impacts of Human Activities on the water cycle at Local and Global Levels " is a great example of a literature review on environmental studies.... This article seeks to investigate how human activities have negatively impacted on the water cycle both at local and global levels....
10 Pages (2500 words) Literature review

Melbourne Goal of Reducing Consumption of Water

Melbourne management of Urban Water Cycle has shifted considerably ever since settlement and going forward with that change, this plan heralds a novel methods rooted in water-cycle planning as well as management.... … The paper "Melbourne Goal of Reducing Consumption of water in the City " is a good example of an environmental studies research proposal.... nbsp;This study addresses the Melbourne goal of reducing consumption of water in the city as well as heightening water recycling as an element of their dedication to sustainable development....
6 Pages (1500 words) Research Proposal
sponsored ads
We use cookies to create the best experience for you. Keep on browsing if you are OK with that, or find out how to manage cookies.
Contact Us