It has been a common practice to discharge water, wastewater and industrial effluents into open channels such as rivers and streams.   Such discharges, in the form of jets, often enter shallow bodies of water typically found in rivers and coastal bays.  In contrast to the existing body of knowledge on unconfined turbulent jets in which the influence of the bounding surface is either absent or minimal, shallowness has a dramatic effect on the flow field of shallow jets.  To better understand and control the a flows/processes, knowledge of the velocity field is an essential ingredient.

Anaerobic digestion is an environmentally-friendly process that breaks down biomass into simpler, more stable components, while simultaneously capturing energy in the form of a methane-rich biogas.  Digesters are usually used to treat wastes, such as at municipal waste facilities, or from livestock farms.  However, anaerobic digesters are not very reliable, suffering from occasional “digester upsets”.  Consequently, anaerobic digestion is less attractive to industry as compared to other less environmental alternatives.  The reason behind this unreliability lies in the complexities of anaero

The Toronto and Region Area of Concern (TRAOC) has been one of the most polluted sites in the Great Lakes posing health risks to millions of people. The Remedial Action Plan (RAP) has made significant progress towards restoring the system and meeting the delisting targets. Yet, several critical questions still need to be addressed, such as: How close is the Toronto ecosystem currently to meeting the TRAOC RAP delisting criteria? What additional research and assessment will be required to guide remedial actions? Which attributes best reflect the integrity and health of the ecosystem?

The lightning return-stroke is the vital component of a lightning flash since it causes most of the lightning-related damages/disturbances to electric power lines and installations. This research emphasizes the development of a lightning return-stroke model in order to analytically correlate the lightning current, usually measured at a tall structure, to its associated lightning electromagnetic pulse (LEMP).

Chinese cities are amongst the fasted growing cities in the world and they have per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) emission rates that are similar to western cities. This research quantifies GHG emissions for the three Chinese city]provinces of Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin. A computer model is then developed for projecting the future growth in Shanghaifs emissions under current policies and infrastructure plans.

Domestic/municipal wastewaters in rural areas are often treated using septic tank systems which are often not very efficient. Because of this, effluent from septic systems often pollutes rivers, lakes and groundwater. To address this, Stantec, along with Ecowork of Japan, is interested in evaluating an innovative septic system for Essex, Ontario, where a pilot unit will be set up and run for 12 months. All important pollution parameters will be evaluated and the process and design parameters will be optimized.