LEAP-HI: Catalyzing Resilient Urban Infrastructure Systems: Integrating the Natural and Built Environments

这个“美国繁荣、健康和基础设施领先工程”（LEAP-HI）项目的目的是改变雨水基础设施的设计、实施和性能，以减少急性和慢性洪水，并提高社区的能力，特别是那些资源不足的社区，为极端天气事件做好准备，从极端天气事件中恢复并适应极端天气事件。通过将基于生态的绿色基础设施（GI）与现有的建筑基础设施（BI）相结合，该项目将研究技术和财务策略，以保护当地社区免受当前和未来的洪水破坏，并促进美国社区的经济，社会和生态重建。这种多学科合作的成果是基于GI网络的城市水循环的重塑，不仅改善了水资源管理，提高了当地环境的宜居性和质量，而且比现有的（BI）铺路，管道和抽水实践更具适应性，稳健性和弹性。研究团队将确定并解决将GI限制在具有有限真实的时间性能数据的单个安装或仍然未实现的计划的障碍。 在此过程中，该项目将开发工程工具并将其应用于真实的社区，其真实的结果将影响真实的生活，从而将雨水径流转化为社区资产。（传感器网络，数据采集，模型开发，和网络设计），这将允许将绿色基础设施（GI）网络与现有的已建基础设施（BI）集成，以便在系统级管理雨水，预测性能和成本和扩大效益的定量评估，包括水质、生物多样性和社区福祉。这项研究的智力意义在于，它使得从孤立的GI装置作为随机部署的美化工作的应用过渡到GI网络的工程系统成为可能，这些GI网络协同作用，以取代或增强日益恶化的泵和管道网络。 该项目采用了一种系统方法，其中GI/BI网络设计为以可实现的预测和扩展性能指标进行操作，因为网络设计是根据当地条件定制的。对芝加哥和匹兹堡的试验床进行了详细研究，这两个城市持续存在雨水问题，但地形和基础设施设计根本不同，为在广泛的社区中复制奠定了基础。通过从根本上提高我们预测GI/BI网络性能的能力，该项目解决了美国国家工程院的三个重大挑战：恢复和改善城市基础设施，提供清洁用水，以及管理氮循环。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The aim of this Leading Engineering for America's Prosperity, Health, and Infrastructure (LEAP-HI) project is to transform the design, implementation, and performance of stormwater infrastructure to reduce acute and chronic flooding and increase the ability of communities, and particularly those that are under-resourced, to prepare for, recover from, and adapt to extreme weather events. By integrating ecologically-based Green Infrastructure (GI) with existing Built Infrastructure (BI), the project will research technical and financial strategies to protect local communities from current and future flood damages and boost economic, social, and ecological redevelopment in neighborhoods across the US. The outcome of this multidisciplinary collaboration is the reinvention of the urban water cycle based on GI networks that not only improve water management and enhance the livability and quality of local environments, but also are more adaptive, robust, and resilient than the established (BI) practice of paving, piping and pumping. The research team will identify and then resolve the hurdles that have limited GI to single installations with limited real time performance data or to plans that remain unrealized. In doing so, this project will develop and apply engineering tools to real communities with real outcomes affecting real lives and, thereby, convert stormwater runoff into a community asset.The overarching goal of this LEAP-HI project is to research the engineering tools (sensor network, data acquisition, model development, and network design) that will allow the integration of Green Infrastructure (GI) networks with existing Built Infrastructure (BI) for the management of stormwater with systems-level, predictive performance and quantitative assessment of costs and expanded benefits, including water quality, biodiversity and community well-being. The intellectual significance of the research is that it makes possible the transition from application of isolated GI installations as randomly deployed beautification efforts to engineered systems of GI networks that function synergistically to replace or enhance deteriorating networks of pumps and pipes. This project employs a systems approach in which GI/BI networks are designed to operate with predictive and expanded performance metrics that are achievable because the network designs are tailored to local conditions. Detailed study of test beds in Chicago and Pittsburgh, two cities with ongoing stormwater issues but fundamentally different topographies and infrastructure design, establish the basis for replication in a wide range of communities. By fundamentally improving our ability to predict GI/BI network performance, this project addresses three National Academy of Engineering Grand Challenges: restore and improve urban infrastructure, provide access to clean water, and manage the nitrogen cycle.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.