ENSC18 BioInfiltration Pond Monitor
Team Members: Jason Neibergs, Kevin Krzyzewski,
Connor Trimble, Matthew Winterle
Faculty Advisor: Aimee Navickis-Brasch
Sponsor: Spokane County
Liaison: Matt Zarecor
Center for Engineering Design and Entrepreneurship
Civil Engineering Department Student Project
REQUEST FOR PROPOSAL
Project Title:
Bio-Infiltration Pond: Stormwater BMP Performance Monitoring
Due Wednesday, October 14, 2015
CEDE - Civil Engineering requests a student project proposal for the following project:
This project focuses on evaluating the effectiveness of a bio-infiltration pond that is located on Gonzaga University’s campus
SUMMARY INFORMATION
Due October 14, 2015, before 4:00 PM PST
One digital copy in pdf format and one hard copy of proposal must be submitted.
Location for Proposal Delivery:
Ms. Toni Boggan,
Assistant Director CEDE,
Gonzaga University School of Engineering and Applied Science,
PACCAR 213, Spokane, WA 99258.
509-313-3913
Project Sponsor
The sponsor of this project is:
Spokane County
The liaison engineer is: The project advisor is:
Matt Zarecor, P.E. Aimee Navickis-Brasch
Phone 509-477-7255 Adjunct Faculty of Civil Engineering
MZarecor@spokancounty.org 509-995-0557
navickis-brasch@gonzaga.edu
Project Description:
The CEDE - Civil Engineering Department is requesting a proposal from the group of student engineers to provide comprehensive engineering efforts and services related to the monitoring and evaluation of the effectiveness of a bio-infiltration pond that is located on Gonzaga University’s campus. This project represents the third phase of a multiyear collaboration between the Spokane County and Gonzaga University.
EVALUATION PROCESS
The proposal evaluation process will be determined by the project advisor in conjunction with the CEDE, the project sponsor, and the CEDE Design Advisory Board. It will be based on the organization of the project efforts reflected in the proposal and the educational goals achieved in the completion of the proposal. Note that some efforts in the project are oriented to achieve educational goals that are not required to achieve the project sponsors goals.
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
This project focuses on monitoring and evaluating the effectiveness of a bio-infiltration pond that is located on Gonzaga University’s campus. These stormwater best management practice (BMP) are common in EWA and typically located adjacent to a parking lot or other pollutant generating impervious surface. Bio-infiltration ponds are shallow vegetated depression that use a combination of grass and engineered soils to reduce stormwater pollutants through filtration natural degradation, and infiltration of the treated stormwater into the ground. Spokane County constructed the bio-infiltration pond in the fall of 2014 (followed by reconstruction in the summer of 2015) in preparation of future NPDES permit requirements, which will require the County to demonstrate the effectiveness of BMPs through water quality monitoring. A challenge with implementation of these BMP monitoring programs is currently no guidelines exist for designing or maintaining an effective monitoring system and the existing monitoring guidance for collecting stormwater samples was developed based on Western Washington’s climatic conditions. In addition, the current soil media mix design includes 40% compost to enhance plant growth and reduced dissolved metals. However, previous studies indicate the compost is leaching nutrients (phosphorus and nitrogen). To address these challenges and leaching concerns, a multi-year project partnership was developed between Gonzaga University and Spokane County. The project started during the 2013-2014 academic year (year 1) with a team of senior design students designing a dual cell pond (with 12” soil mix in one cell and the required 18” in the other cell) and monitoring system for both ponds. The 2014-2015 senior design team (year 2) evaluated the constructed monitoring system operation, identified/designed system retrofits, developed monitoring guidelines specific to EWA, and estimated the leaching potential of the different soil depths with respect to time.
The goal of the 2015-2016 project is to further inform, refine, and finalize the monitoring system design and guidance as well as evaluate and compare the effectiveness of the two different soil depths. The goals will be achieved through analysis of water quantity and quality data collected in the field during simulated and natural rainfall events as well as using data collected by the year 2 team. The water quality analysis will focus on the following pollutants; total suspended solids, Total Petroleum Hydrocarbons, Total Phosphorus, Total Nitrogen, Total/Dissolved Metals (Copper, Zinc, Mercury, Lead, Cadmium), and Fecal Coliform. The five objectives for this project include:
1. Develop an understanding of the project history, BMP function/operation; NPDES permit requirements, proper water quality sampling techniques, and technical writing skills necessary to successfully complete the project tasks.
2. Evaluate the constructed monitoring system operation to verify the retrofit addresses the concerns identified by the 2014-2015 student team.
3. Evaluate and refine the monitoring procedures for sample collection including guidance that addresses EWA climatic conditions (e.g. qualifying storm events) and develop guidance for maintaining the pond.
4. Evaluate and compare the short-term effectiveness of the two different soil depths using water quality samples from a maximum of eight events.
5. Prepare documentation summarizing the project findings for Spokane County and next year’s senior design team.
PROJECT INFORMATION AVAILABLE
The project team must familiarize themselves with the project in order to properly prepare the project proposal. The previous two years senior design team final reports and associated documents should be reviewed. Additional technical documents, outside of the scope of the feasibility study, may need to be reviewed as well.
STUDENT PROJECT ACTIVITIES REQUIRED
The student project group will, at a minimum, provide the following efforts and deliverables in the completion of the project addressed in this proposal:
Scope of Activities Required to Meet Project Goals
Task 100 Project Management and Coordination
The student group shall organize, manage, and coordinate the efforts required to accomplish the project using standard project management and contract administration techniques. Key management activities are identified below:
Sub-Task 110 Kick-off Meeting
The Student Team will contact their advisor to schedule a kickoff meeting within 24 hours of being assigned to the senior design project. During this first meeting, their project advisor will provide the team with an overview of the project, previous project documentation and resources, schedule training, initial assignments, data management system, and project management assignments for the year.
Sub-Task 120 Regular Advisor and Liaison Meetings
After the kick-off meeting, the Student Team will meet at a regularly scheduled time each week with the project advisor, and when needed with the project liaison. All meetings with advisor and liaison MUST be arranged by members of the Student Team in advance (at least 2 days prior).
Sub-Task 130 Weekly Reports (agendas, mini-progress reports, project schedule, and meeting minutes)
The team project manager will develop these weekly reports and submit electronically to all team members and the project advisor by 5:00 pm the night before a meeting. Agendas will outline the items to be discussed during the weekly meeting. Mini-progress reports must include, at a minimum, activities completed by each team member for the current week, expected work for the upcoming week, and a meeting agenda. All meetings must be documented by the Student Team in the form of meeting minutes. The project schedule shall be developed following the first meeting and updated each week.
Sub-Task 140 Record Keeping
In addition, a complete hardcopy record of the project reports and files must be maintained by the student team and be made readily available during consultations with the faculty advisor. A good way to keep track of all this is to have a project notebook. The advisor will ask to review this notebook periodically to discover the status of the work being completed. In addition, the faculty advisor has setup a data management organizational system on a share point site and students will be expected to follow this system and save copies of all project data/documentation.
Sub-Task 150 Quality Assurance/Quality Control
The Student Team will perform a methodical QA/QC effort in a manner suitable to the project advisor and liaison, to prevent incorrect, sub-standard or dangerous results from being included in the end of semester project reports.
Sub-Task 160 Project Schedule / WBS /Gantt Chart
The proposal must contain a Gantt chart that shows the due dates from the CEDE schedule (shown in this document later) as milestones, each sub-task, the duration of time proposed to complete the subtask and the team member responsible for the subtask. The student group will include a “proposed” budget that details the costs of completing the project design tasks. This budget is not the “engineers construction cost estimate” to complete the implementation of the design; rather, it is the costs to perform the engineering tasks and includes the fictitious value of project team personnel hours. The value of the personnel hours and other associated costs (travel, books, etc.) will be the proposed budget and will simulate the budget a consulting group would charge to complete the project.
Task 100 Deliverables and Timeline
· Electronic copy of agenda for team meetings.
· Electronic updates to project design budget and schedule that includes budget and personnel hours for each sub-task in the entire project.
· Electronic copy of resolutions and action items for each meeting (meeting minutes).
· Statement on the QA/QC activities for reports submitted at the end of each semester to describe the review and checking procedure employed.
Task 200 Review Previous Project Documentation and Train the Students (Objective 1)
This task will occur at the start of the fall semester. The purpose of this task is for the students to become familiar with the history of the project, function/operation of the BMP, permit requirements, as well as prepare the students for monitoring simulated natural rainfall events and documenting the project findings. This will generally include the students reviewing previous senior design documentation and the students attending training necessary to conduct a literature search, write technical documents, and properly collect water quality samples. The task approach is further described below.
At the start of the semester, students will be expected to review previous documentation on the project and be prepared to discuss the project during the first few project meetings. In lieu of a project proposal, the student team will conduct a literature search and develop a synthesis of literature on approximately 8-12 studies (2-3 per student). The literature search will focus on answering questions that will be identified by the advisor at the start of the project but generally relate to: proper procedures for collecting water quality samples, similar BMP studies, NPDES permit requirements, expected pollutant behavior/runoff treatment, and Ecology BMP performance/monitoring requirements (questions). The students will present the highlights of the synthesis during the fall senior design presentations. In preparation for this task, students will attend a scheduled training with library staff regarding how to conduct a literature search and the faculty advisor will provide the student team with guidance on technical writing skills.
Task 200 Deliverables and Timeline:
· Review Previous Project Documentation – No formal deliverable; students will be prepared to discuss at the weekly meeting(s) with the faculty advisor during the first weeks of project.
· Literature Search and Technical Writing Training – First weeks of project students will attend training and prepare summaries of the individual journal articles that will be incorporated into the synthesis of literature.
· Synthesis of literature – Will be submitted on the same day as the senior design project proposals. Prior to submittal, the two-stormwater senior design student teams will swap literature searches and conduct a peer review (review/comment) of each other’s papers. After the peer review is complete, each student team will incorporate and respond to the other team’s comments and be prepared to discuss during their weekly meeting.
· Presentation – Fall Senior Design Presentations.
Task 300 Evaluate the Constructed Monitoring System Operation (Objective 2)
The purpose of this task is to help the students become familiar with the operating the monitoring equipment, refine and finalize the testing procedures, and to evaluate the newly constructed monitoring system (verify the retrofits address the issues identified in year 2). This task includes the student team running two simulated rainstorm events as well data collection and analysis. (For this task, no water quality samples collected from the simulated events will sent to the lab for analysis). The task approach is further described below.
The students will simulate rainfall events using a fire hose and following both manual and automatic procedures for measuring influent and effluent flow rates. This will also include generating inflow and outflow hydrographs and balancing the inflow to the two pond cells. The accuracy of the data collected using the ISCO Samplers (automatic) will be verified by comparing flow rates collected from both manual and automatic samples. In addition, a simulated event will occur on October 14th which will include demonstrating the monitoring system operation to Ecology and the Eastern Washington Stormwater Permit Coordinators Group (EWSWPCG).
The students will follow the draft procedures developed by the Year 2 students for running the simulated event and balancing the inflows to each pond. After each simulated event, the student team will review and refine the procedures based on any lessons learned during testing. In addition, after each simulated events, the student teams will develop a reporting template (1-2 page) and document the testing including; an overview of the testing completed, analysis of any data, and describe any corrective action required to the procedures or motoring system.
Task 300 Deliverable(s) and Timeline:
· Hydrographs – The inflow and outflow hydrographs generated during the simulated events will be included in the end of fall report along data summarized in tables.
· Refine Procedures - for balancing the inflows and running simulated events (both manual and automatic sampling). Procedure revisions will be identified by the student team (and reviewed with the faculty advisor) within 48 hours of the simulated event with revisions complete within one week after the event.
· Pond Demonstration for EWSCG – October 14th.
· Testing Report – The template will be developed prior to the first simulated event and each test report will be included in the end of fall semester report.
Task 400 Refine/Finalize the Sampling Procedures and Develop BMP Maintenance Guidance (Objective 3)
The purpose of this task is to refine and finalize the QAPP monitoring procedures for sample collection, and recommend maintenance guidance for the pond. This will generally include collecting samples from eight rainfall events, reviewing the procedures before and after each event, identifying corrective action, and revising the procedures as needed. Additional analysis and literature search will also be required to evaluate and finalize the procedures. The task approach is further described below.
The students will follow the Sampling Procedures defined in the QAPP for monitoring each of the natural rainfall events (maximum of 8 events). Prior to each event students will review the procedures which will include; monitoring the weather, criteria for qualifying storm events, sample collection and preservation, sample identification, chain of custody documents requirements, and submit samples to the lab for testing,. After each event, the student team will review and refine the procedures based on any lessons learned during the event. The student teams will develop a brief report (for each semester) that provides an overview of the testing completed, analysis of any data, and corrective action (if any) required to the sampling procedures.
In addition, the student team will also conducted a statistical analysis of historical rainfall records for Spokane to determine the probability of qualifying events occurring within a given year. This information will be used to support or modify the recommendations for qualifying rainfall events that were identified by the year 2 team. Lastly, the student team will develop guidance for maintaining the pond through their own experiences during the project as well as from an additional literature search of similar studies.
Task 400 Deliverable(s) and Timeline:
· Refined/Final Procedures – End of Fall semester (update and status) and End of Spring Semester (Final Procedures)
· Statistical Analysis of Rainfall Records – This task will be completed in two parts:
1. Fall Semester - At the end of the fall semester students will complete a preliminary analysis and summary which will be documented in the end of semester report
2. Spring Semester - At the end of the spring semester students will complete the final analysis and summary for the Technical Evaluation Report (TER) with recommendations documented in the QAPP Monitoring Procedures.
· Maintenance Guidelines - End of fall semester students will develop an outline of guidelines, which will be further developed into a short (3-4 page) summary at the end of the spring semester.
Task 500 Evaluate the Short Term Effectiveness of two Different Soil Mixes (Objective 4)
The purpose of this task is to evaluate and compare the short-term effectiveness of two different soil depths. This will include analyzing laboratory data from influent and effluent water quality samples collected from a maximum of eight rainfall events (task 3). In addition, the effectiveness will also be evaluated based on changes in the pond saturated hydraulic conductivity (Ksat) which will include measuring the Ksat from each pond cell using a falling head test and comparing the Ksat to the baseline Ksat collected during year 2. The task approach is further described below.
The student team will follow the procedures outlined in the QAPP to perform the data analysis. The data analysis will include comparing the influent and effluent pollutant concentrations to determine if the difference in concentrations are statistically significant (hypothesis testing using a paired t-test) and the pollutant reduction to a confidence interval of 95% using the bootstrap method. Hypothesis testing will be conducted for every pollutant at each pond and between each pond. Additional analysis will be conducted to compare the changes in Ksat from year 2 and year 3. Within 48 hours of collecting (Ksat values) or receiving water quality data from the lab, the data will be uploaded the share point site.
Students will develop a technical evaluation report (TER) summarizing the study including a listing of which pollutants the pond(s) reduced, comparing the results from the different ponds as well as to data collected from year 2 (field monitoring and column studies), and identify questions that need to be addressed by future senior design teams. In addition, students may also recommend changes to the soil media mix and pond design. The results from the evaluation will be compared to the Ecology’s performance requirements (defined the TAPE guidance) to determine if the goals are achieved for each regulated pollutant (specifically; TSS, Cu, Zn, TP, and TPH). All results will be summarize into tables and box plots and included in the final TER, see next section for further guidance on project documentation.
Task 500 Deliverable(s) and Timeline:
· Sharp Ave Stormwater Characterization – Summary and tables will be included Presentation of Evaluation – During the spring semester, the results will be presented both mid semester (based on work complete) and at the end of the semester.
Task 600 Document the Project Findings (Objective 5)
At the end of the spring semester students will summarize the project findings and status into the final TER along with additional documents in the appendix including; copies of the chain of custody forms and raw data (including lab reports). The student teams will develop a TER that includes the synthesis of literature, an overview of the methods, discussion of results and findings, and recommendations. The TER will be developed following Ecology requirements and a TBD Journal formatting requirements (in preparation for future publication). The students will also summarize the project into the format of an EPA/Ecology fact sheet (3-4 pages) for the senior design presentations, which will also serve as the template for the end of year project poster.
In addition, the students will also revise portions of the QAPP where they have identified revisions based on previous tasks completed during the semester. Finally, the student team will prepare a letter for the 2016-2017 senior design team summarizing the status of project at the end of the 2016 spring semester including recommendations for the next project steps.
Task 600 Deliverable(s) and Timeline:
The following items will be completed at the end of the spring semester:
· Technical Evaluation Report
· Fact Sheet
· Revised QAPP
· Letter to 2016-2017 Senior Design Team
PROJECT SCHEDULE
Time is of the essence on this project. The project schedule contains some specific milestones and also must accommodate the academic calendar. The student group may use the general dates below, as a guide, to develop the comprehensive schedule required for the proposal.
Information on Proposals Available: September 2, 2015
Teams Selected: September 4, 2015
Sponsor Workshop September 4, 2015
Civil CEDE Mandatory All Student/Advisor Meeting September 9, 2015
Workshop 1 Project Plans September 16, 2015
Workshop 2 Team Work and Communication September 23, 2015
Workshop 3 FolioTek Info, Tech Support, etc. September 30, 2015
Project Plans Due by 4 pm October 14, 2015
Founder’s Day Holiday / Midterms October 19, 2015
Project Plan Presentations October 21, 2015
Workshop 4 Report Writing November 4, 2015
Thanksgiving Holiday November 25 – 27, 2015
Project Status Presentations December 9, 2015
Project Status Reports Due by 4 pm December 11, 2015
Reading Days December 12 – 14, 2015
Classes Begin January 12, 2016
Martin Luther King, Jr., Holiday January 18, 2016
Workshop 3 Working to Completion January 20, 2016
President's Day Holiday February 15, 2016
Project Status Presentations February 17, 2016
Team Photos and Project Summaries Due March 2, 2016
Spring Vacation March 7 – 11, 2016
Good Friday – Easter Holiday March 25 – March 28, 2016
Final Reports Due April 27, 2016
Final Design Presentation