K. Van Leeuwen Van Leeuwen | Utrecht University (original) (raw)

Papers by K. Van Leeuwen Van Leeuwen

Most of the world's population lives in urban areas. Urbanization puts a lot of pressure on the c... more Most of the world's population lives in urban areas. Urbanization puts a lot of pressure on the city in terms of the environment, raw materials, infrastructure, and social and institutional changes. This pressure on urban areas creates challenges in the dynamics of cities, such as housing, drinking water, and wastewater. For a livable city, the water in the city has to be well managed. The water system is increasingly influenced by human and natural factors, which can cause changes in the water system. The capital of the Netherlands, Amsterdam is home to more than 800,000 people. Because of its geographic location, the city is closely linked to water. Due to developments in water safety, water quality, and robust water infrastructure, Amsterdam has developed into an attractive, economically healthy, and safe city that scores highly in the field of water management worldwide. In the future, Amsterdam has to continue its investment in the development and maintenance of the water system to meet its future challenges. For these future investments, it is important to research developments in the field of water management and governance and to gain knowledge from them. The following main research question

Integrated Environmental Assessment and Management, 2011

Intent. The intent of Learned Discourses is to provide a forum for open discussion. These article... more Intent. The intent of Learned Discourses is to provide a forum for open discussion. These articles reflect the professional opinions of the authors regarding scientific issues. They do not represent SETAC positions or policies. And, although they are subject to editorial review for clarity, consistency, and brevity, these articles are not peer reviewed. The Learned Discourses date from 1996 in the North America SETAC News and, when that publication was replaced by the SETAC Globe, continued there through 2005. The continued success of Learned Discourses depends on our contributors. We encourage timely submissions that will inform and stimulate discussion. We expect that many of the articles will address controversial topics, and promise to give dissenting opinions a chance to be heard. Rules. All submissions must be succinct: no longer than 1000 words, no more than 6 references, and at most one table or figure. Reference format must follow the journal requirement found on the Internet at http://www.setacjournals.org. Topics must fall within IEAM's sphere of interest. Submissions. All manuscripts should be sent via email as Word attachments to Peter M Chapman

Water Resources Management

Water scarcity and accessibility remain persistently amongst the most prominent global challenges... more Water scarcity and accessibility remain persistently amongst the most prominent global challenges. Although there is a wide agreement among international organizations that Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) and water governance are key to overcome water-related challenges, global assessments of the progress made by cities is lacking. This paper for the first time analyses the challenges of water, wastewater, municipal solid waste and climate change in cities. We used empirical studies (125 cities) based on the City Blueprint Approach and developed a statistical estimation model to estimate IWRM performances of another 75 cities. These 200 cities in total represent more than 95% of the global urban population. This comprehensive global picture enables us to evaluate the existing gaps in achieving water-related Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), in particular SDG 6 (clean water and sanitation) and SDG 11 (sustainable cities and communities). The best performing cities we...

Cities

Highlights • The potential of city-to-city (C2C) learning to address water issues is largely unta... more Highlights • The potential of city-to-city (C2C) learning to address water issues is largely untapped • We reflect on the role of C2C learning in water governance • The City Blueprint indicator framework is suggested as a city-matching methodology • The City Blueprint's main strengths & limitations for C2C learning are outlined

Moreover, the TBL report also includes a graphic presentation of the performance of the water uti... more Moreover, the TBL report also includes a graphic presentation of the performance of the water utilities over the past 10 years for 15 key indicators, allowing for identifying and analysing trends over time. Each water utility based on TBL performance reports have to provide an Action Plan to the Council that addresses areas of under-performance.

Environmental Science & Technology, 2004

Little is known about the environmental hazards linked to the treatment of farm animals with anti... more Little is known about the environmental hazards linked to the treatment of farm animals with antibiotics and subsequent spreading of manure, especially regarding soil microbial communities. In this investigation, pollutioninduced community tolerance (PICT) of bacteria from soils artificially spiked with the sulfonamide sulfachloropyridazine (SCP) was investigated. Tolerance of the bacterial communities after 3 weeks' exposure to SCP was determined by analyzing the sensitivity of 31 microbial metabolic processes in microtiter plates. Bacterial suspensions extracted from soils containing higher concentrations of SCP showed an increased tolerance of their metabolic activities to this antibiotic. An increase in tolerance by 10% was found at 7.3 mg/kg dw SCP. The PICT effect could be demonstrated by both a shift in the tolerance of the average of all metabolic activities and a shift of the physiological process sensitivity distributions made up from the single metabolic processes. The PICT effect was accompanied by smaller changes in the communitylevel physiological profile (CLPP). To conclude, PICT has been shown to be a versatile and illustrative method for the detection of the effects of antibacterial agents on soil microorganisms.

Environmental Science & Technology

Water, 2019

Today, over 50% of the global population lives near water. Due to population growth, ongoing econ... more Today, over 50% of the global population lives near water. Due to population growth, ongoing economic development, and extreme weather events, urban areas are growing more susceptible to flood risks, and the costs of inaction of failing to manage flood risks are high. Research into the benefits of pluvial flood-risk management is needed to spread awareness and motivate investments in pluvial flood-risk reduction. So far, such research is lacking. This research therefore assesses pluvial flood damage from a single 60mm/1-hour rainfall event in the cities of Rotterdam and Leicester using 3Di flood modelling and the flood damage estimation tool (waterschadeschatter; WSS). The results demonstrate that potential pluvial flood damages exceed €10 million in each city. From this research, inhabitants and authorities of Leicester and Rotterdam can learn that preparing for upcoming pluvial floods can save millions of euros resulting from future damages. The application of these tools also mak...

Water, 2022

In many places around the globe, groundwater has been threatened by various pressures, which call... more In many places around the globe, groundwater has been threatened by various pressures, which calls for better management strategies for groundwater sustainability. In this study, we suggest a novel framework for identifying factors critical to coastal groundwater based on results from City Blueprint (CB) assessments. By compiling the 5856 indicator results of the City Blueprint Approach (CBA) from 122 cities and analyzing the correlation between these indicators, we constructed City Blueprint networks (CBN) by using a complex network modeling approach for three groups of cities: all 122 cities, 40 coastal, and 82 non-coastal cities. These networks were then analyzed for their node centralities to identify major factors that influence coastal groundwater management. Interestingly, our analysis revealed that groundwater has various indirect but important links with the factors that are typically unexplored in the literature. We also assessed the CB of the two largest coastal cities in...

Sustainability, 2022

Windhoek, Namibia, faces water stress, urbanisation, climate change and governance challenges; th... more Windhoek, Namibia, faces water stress, urbanisation, climate change and governance challenges; these issues are constraining water provision and underpinning the urgency to implement an integrated water resource management plan. Windhoek has provided access to water during droughts by relying on multiple water resources including treated wastewater. However, significant infrastructure investments are required to ensure continued water security. Through applying the City Blueprint Approach—an indicator assessment aiming to provide a holistic understanding of water management and governance—we substantiate how Namibia can enhance the capacity to implement legislation, with long-term focus and collaboration with experts and stakeholders.

Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry, 1999

... In this section the consistency of EURAM according to this framework and in particular to the... more ... In this section the consistency of EURAM according to this framework and in particular to the ... 6 The role of valuation in aggregation and weighting has been justified in terms of scientific ... to data availability, because according to the regulation [1] one of the criteria for selecting ...

The world will experience an estimated 40% freshwater supply shortage by 2030, converting water s... more The world will experience an estimated 40% freshwater supply shortage by 2030, converting water scarcity into one of the principal global challenges that modern society face. Urban water-reuse is recognized as a promising and necessary measure to alleviate the growing water stress in many regions. The transformation to widespread application of water-reuse systems requires major changes in the way water is governed, and countries such as Spain already find themselves involved in this process. Through the systematic assessment of the city of Sabadell (Spain), we aim to identify the main barriers, opportunities and transferable lessons that can enhance governance capacity to implement systems for non-potable reuse of treated wastewater in cities. It was found that continuous learning, the availability and quality of information and level of knowledge and strong agents of change are the main capacity-building priorities. On the other hand, awareness, multilevel network potential and im...

This book describes different possibilities of stakeholder involvement in the nature science rese... more This book describes different possibilities of stakeholder involvement in the nature science research process. It summarizes the outlines and results of two stakeholder workshops of the OSIRIS project. OSIRIS will develop integrated testing strategies (ITS) fit for REACH. These enable to significantly increase the use of non-testing information for regulatory decision making, and thus to minimise the need for animal testing.

Environmental science and pollution research international, 2007

Climate change and urban growth are making this question ever more important. Despite numerous po... more Climate change and urban growth are making this question ever more important. Despite numerous potential solutions – available from existing scientific knowledge and practical experiences – many cities and organisations have yet to find adequate responses to their water challenges. Part of the problem is that most water challenges today transcend administrative boundaries and challenge us to go beyond traditional short-term and sectorial ways of governing water, which have given little consideration to the long-term impacts on the entire hydrological cycle.

Cleaner Environmental Systems

Water

The capital of The Netherlands, Amsterdam, is home to more than 800,000 people. Developments in w... more The capital of The Netherlands, Amsterdam, is home to more than 800,000 people. Developments in water safety, water quality, and robust water infrastructure transitioned Amsterdam into an attractive, economically healthy, and safe city that scores highly in the field of water management. However, investments need to be continued to meet future challenges. Many other cities in the world have just started their transition to become water-wise. For those cities, it is important to assess current water management and governance practices, in order to set their priorities and to gain knowledge from the experiences of more advanced cities such as Amsterdam. We investigate how Amsterdam’s water management and governance developed historically and how these lessons can be used to further improve water management in Amsterdam and other cities. This retrospective analysis starts at 1672 and applies the City Blueprint Approach as a baseline water management assessment. It shows that developmen...