Wet weather water quality modelling of a Portuguese urban catchment: difficulties and benefits

This paper discusses the use of water quality deterministic modelling together with an integrated approach to assess the impact of urban stormwater discharges into ephemeral watercourses, based on the study of a Portuguese catchment. The description of the main aspects, difficulties and benefits found during data collection and model calibration and verification is presented, and the associated uncertainties and errors discussed. Experimental results showed a strong short- and long-term impact of sewer discharges on rivers, and confirmed deposition, resuspension and transport of pollutants as important processes for the water quality. However, the resuspension of riverbed sediment pollutants during storms was probably more significant than the direct impact of the urban discharges. The HydroWorks model was used since it allows for the calculation of pollutant build-up on catchment surfaces and in gully pots, their wash-off, and the deposition and erosion of sediments in sewers. However, it uses several constants, which could not be independently calibrated, increasing the uncertainty already associated with the data. River flows have quite different magnitude from the sewer system overflows, which, together with the difficulties in evaluating river flow rates, makes the integrated modelling approach rather complex and costly.