Is stormwater harvesting beneficial to urban waterway environmental flows?

Abstract

Urbanization degrades the hydrology and water quality of waterways. Changes to flow regimes include increased frequency of surface runoff, increased peak flows and an increase in total runoff. At the same time, water use in many cities is approaching, and in some cases exceeding, sustainable limits. Stormwater harvesting has the potential to mitigate a number of these detrimental impacts. However, excessive harvesting of stormwater could also be detrimental to stream health. Therefore, a study was undertaken to test whether typical stormwater harvesting scenarios could meet the dual objectives of (i) supplying urban water requirements, and (ii) restoring the flow regime as close as possible ..