PARENT SESSION
Poster Session #24: Modeling.
Tuesday, August 6. Presentation from 5:00 PM to 6:30 PM. Exhibit Hall B & C, TCC

Modeling effects of land use on aquatic biota.

Wellman, Marjorie Coombs^*,1, Park, Richard², Clough, Jonathan³, Duda, Paul⁴, ¹ U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, DC² Eco Modeling, Diamondhead, MS³ Warren Pinnacle Consulting, Inc, Warren, VT⁴ AQUA TERRA Consultants, Decatur, GA

ABSTRACT- Some of the important questions facing water resource managers include: What are the effects of land use, agricultural practices, industrial and stormwater discharges, climate change and other activities on aquatic ecosystems and their biota? Where improvements in these activities are anticipated, what will be the corresponding changes in the aquatic biota? Will water quality standards and designated aquatic life uses be met? Over what time span will these changes be achieved? AQUATOX, a process-based integrated fate and effects simulation model, addresses these issues in Release 2 by linking to the BASINS 3 geographic information system and watershed modeling software package. Within this system either the HSPF or SWAT runoff models can be run to provide site characteristics and time-series inputs of inflow, nutrients, sediments, and organic chemicals, all automatically formatted for AQUATOX. A new AQUATOX Wizard steps the user through the setup, and the post-processor in BASINS increases analytical and statistical capabilities for model output. For example, in an application in Pennsylvania, HSPF simulated runoff from forested, agricultural, and urban lands and effluent from a wastewater treatment plant in several management scenarios. These were then simulated in AQUATOX to determine anticipated improvements in biotic endpoints including periphyton, aquatic insects, and fish species in the river.

KEY WORDS: AQUATOX, ecosystem modeling, GIS, land use