Applied Environmental Systems Modeling

This book aims to introduce essential concepts of pollutant fate and transport using hands-on model building approach. The first part of the book provides a refresher on pertinent theory with special emphasis on obtaining fluxes and mass-loadings for various physical, chemical and biological processes in natural and engineered systems which are part of the mass-balance formulation. The second part of the book deals with mathematical and numerical approaches for solving mass-balance expressions. A wide range of techniques including the numerical differentiation of ordinary and partial differential equations are discussed. The implementation of these methods on Microsoft Excel[registered] spreadsheet is detailed in a workbook format using diagrams and screenshots.The book will serve as a text/workbook for an introductory Fate and Transport Modeling class offered to advanced undergraduates and early graduate students. In addition, it can also be used as a supplementary text for courses in environmental transport processes and process dynamics.
As all the models are derived using a commonly available spreadsheet program and are illustrated in detail, the book will also appeal to self-learning environmental engineering practitioners. Despite their introductory nature, the models presented here can be useful for making initial estimates and design calculations and carrying out preliminary planning and feasibility studies. The material presented in this book is expected to provide the necessary background to understand advanced modeling texts and journal articles.