Showing papers by "Brian L. Smith published in 2018"

Including uncertainty in valuing blue and green infrastructure for stormwater management

Abstract: Blue and green infrastructure (BGI) provides a wide range of ecosystem services (ES) and other benefits when managing stormwater, beyond flow and pollution control A number of tools have been developed to value these benefits In the UK, stormwater measures that utilise BGI are known as Sustainable Drainage Systems (SuDS) This paper outlines the Benefits of SuDS Tool (B£ST), developed in the UK by the Construction Industry Research and Information Association (CIRIA) for valuing the benefits of BGI stormwater measures The tool has been applied to case studies across Europe B£ST includes a set of benefits based on ecosystem services applied to the use of BGI for stormwater management The paper focuses on the uncertainties in this multiple benefit assessment, detailing the processes used in the tool Examples illustrate the scale of the uncertainties in tools like B£ST The uncertainties when using BGI valuation tools such as B£ST to help inform the delivery of stormwater measures are demonstrated in the paper as potentially of sufficient magnitude to warrant explicit consideration by professionals and decision makers

Feasibility Assessment of a Smartphone-Based Application to Estimate Road Roughness

Abstract: Transportation agencies spend significant resources to collect pavement roughness data using profiler vans. A potential alternative to collect functionally equivalent data at a significantly lower cost and higher level of temporal resolution is to use existing accelerometers in smartphones as the “set” of sensors. In this research, a prototype smartphone application was developed to investigate the feasibility of such an approach. Acceleration data were collected using a prototype application running on Android tablets on two routes in Virginia. The analysis results show that the proposed smartphone application can generate consistent data sets from different data collecting runs. In addition, the average of the collected data sets is found to be highly correlated with the International Roughness Index data collected by the Virginia Department of Transportation using profiler vans. Also, a sample size analysis revealed that most pavement sections require fewer than 12 data collecting trips at a 50 Hz sampling rate while fewer than 16 trips are required for a rate of 10 Hz. Finally, a preliminary benefit assessment for Virginia showed that the proposed smartphone application approach allows for collection of comparable roughness data for more roadways, more frequently with significantly less cost.

Demonstrating and Monetizing the Multiple Benefits from Using SuDS

Abstract: Green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) measures provide a wide range of benefits beyond simply dealing with stormwater. In the United Kingdom such measures are termed sustainable drainage sy...

Observatory design for the imaging X-Ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) mission

Abstract: The goal of the Imaging X-Ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) Mission is to expand understanding of high-energy astrophysical processes and sources, in support of NASA's first science objective in Astrophysics: “Discover how the universe works.” Polarization uniquely probes astrophysical anisotropies — ordered magnetic fields, aspheric matter distributions, or general relativistic coupling to black-hole spin — that are not otherwise measurable. IXPE will conduct X-ray polarimetry for multiple categories of cosmic X-ray sources that are likely to be polarized such as neutron stars, stellar-mass black holes, supernova remnants and active galactic nuclei. The IXPE Observatory consists of Spacecraft and Payload modules built up in parallel to form the Observatory during system integration and test. The Payload includes three polarization-sensitive, X-ray detectors, each paired with its corresponding grazing incidence mirror module assembly (MMA). A deployable boom provides the correct separation (focal length) between the detector units (DU) and MMAs. These Payload elements are supported by the IXPE Spacecraft which is derived from the BCP-100 small Spacecraft architecture. This paper summarizes the IXPE mission science objectives, describes the Observatory implementation concept including the payload and spacecraft elements and summarizes the expected concept of operations.