Deltares assists river authorities to improve water quality of Buyuk Menderes river, Turkey

Deltares is to help the Turkish government to improve the water quality in the catchment of the Buyuk Menderes River. The Dutch research institute will provide a range of software tools for the water management authority to monitor the restoration of water quality and monitor their use by the water management authority.

One of the tools involved is WFD Explorer to predict the cost effectiveness of optional measures to improve the water quality in the river. Another tool is Ribasim to quantify the water availability.

Balancing costs and effects
The Buyuk Menderes river is located in the southwest of Turkey, and has many problems with water quality because of the numerous dams, engineering structures, agriculture and industry

Joost van den Roovaart is working on the project for Deltares: "The WFD Explorer shows the effect of particular measures on water quality and the associated costs.In that way, the water authority can strike the right balance between the effectiveness and the cost of an intervention, avoiding expensive measures that produce only marginal improvements in water quality."

WFD Explorer goes international
The WFD Explorer was originally developed for Dutch water authorities to decide which steps they can take to comply with the requirements of the European Water Framework Directive.

Joost van den Roovaart: "But the tool can be used in any country that wants to determine the impact of a particular intervention on water quality and whether an investment is worth making. For example, Deltares recently developed a WFD Explorer application for New Zealand as well."

Water quantity is equally important
Deltares is also supplying Ribasim for quantifying the water availability for the river. "To determine how effective measures are, you need a sound understanding of the Buyuk Menderes water system. How much water is available, and where, and how fast does the water flow in particular places? Where flow rates are low, polluted water is simply removed slower than when rates are high", adds Roovaart.

Knowledge transfer to Turkish water authority
The project will continue until late 2015. By that time, all the tools will be performing optimally and the staff at the Turkish water authority will have been trained work with them.

The completion of the project will include a road show so that the tools can be used in other catchments in Turkey.

Deltares is working on the Buyuk Menderes project for the Turkish ministry of Forestry and Water Affairs, in collaboration with Dutch consultancy company Witteveen + Bos, Dutch regional water authority Peel en Maasvallei, and the Turkish nature organisation Doga Koruma Merkezi.

The project is supported by the Partners for Water programme, which is coordinated by the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO).

This news item was originally published on the website of Deltares.

More information
Deltares
Delft, the Netherlands
+31 88 335 8273 
www.deltares.nl