The Impact of Vegetative Slope on Water Flow and Pollutant Transport through Embankments

Liting Sheng, Zhanyu Zhang, Jihong Xia, Jie Yang, Dan Tang and Xiao-an Chen
Additional contact information
Liting Sheng: Key Laboratory of Efficient Irrigation-Drainage and Agricultural Soil-Water Environment in Southern China of Ministry of Education, Hohai University, Nanjing 210098, China
Zhanyu Zhang: Key Laboratory of Efficient Irrigation-Drainage and Agricultural Soil-Water Environment in Southern China of Ministry of Education, Hohai University, Nanjing 210098, China
Jihong Xia: Key Laboratory of Efficient Irrigation-Drainage and Agricultural Soil-Water Environment in Southern China of Ministry of Education, Hohai University, Nanjing 210098, China
Jie Yang: Jiangxi Province Research Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Nanchang 330029, China
Dan Tang: College of Water Conservancy and Hydropower Engineering, Hohai University, Nanjing 210098, China
Xiao-an Chen: Jiangxi Province Research Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Nanchang 330029, China

Sustainability, 2017, vol. 9, issue 7, 1-12

Abstract: Embankments are common structures along rivers or lakes in riparian zones in plain areas. They should have natural slopes instead of slopes covered by concrete or other hard materials, in order to rebuild sustainable ecosystems for riparian zones. This study was conducted to evaluate the effects of vegetative slopes on water flow and pollutant transport through the embankments. Three embankments with different slope treatments (a bare slope, a slope covered in centipede grass, a slope covered in tall fescue) were examined, and three inflow applications of pollute water with different concentration of total nitrogen (TN) and total phosphorus (TP) used to simulate different agricultural non-point pollution levels. The results showed that the water flux rates of the three embankments were relatively stable under all inflow events, and almost all values were higher than 80%. The embankments with vegetative slopes had better nitrogen removal than the bare slope under all events, and the one with tall fescue slope was best, but the benefits of vegetative slopes decreased with increasing inflow concentration. Moreover, there were no significant differences between the embankments on phosphorus removal, for which the reductions were all high (above 90%) with most loads remaining in the front third of embankment bodies. Overall, the embankments with vegetative slopes had positive effects on water exchange and reducing non-point pollutant into lake or river water, which provides a quantitative scientific basis for the actual layout of lakeshores.

Keywords: embankment; vegetation slope; nitrogen; phosphorus; transport; reduction (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/9/7/1128/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/9/7/1128/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:9:y:2017:i:7:p:1128-:d:102741

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().