CIVIC-PG Track A: Assessing the Performance of Green Stormwater Infrastructure for Climate Adaptation and Coastal Resilience in the City of Cape Canaveral, Florida

该项目计划通过参与性charrette程序，在佛罗里达州卡纳维拉尔角市建立一个城市水文监测网络。像许多沿海社区一样，卡纳维拉尔角也面临着日益增长的洪水风险和近岸水域有害藻类大量繁殖的压力。建筑环境中陈旧的基础设施和加速的气候变化正在放大城市洪水和藻华的影响，从而对公共安全、生态系统健康和私有财产造成越来越大的威胁。卡纳维拉尔角市政府正与学术界和社区合作伙伴合作，计划设计、实施、监测和评估基于自然的绿色雨水基础设施（GSI），作为缓解这些当前和未来压力的一种方法。该GSI监测网络将为卡纳维拉尔角和佛罗里达州东部更广泛的印度河泻湖流域提供重要的好处，同时也为在类似脆弱的沿海地区优化和评估GSI性能提供了机会。GSI指的是一套雨水管理措施，旨在维持、恢复和/或模拟开发前建筑环境中的水文条件。这些做法越来越多地被推广为减少洪水风险、改善水质、改善城市栖息地和创造有价值的绿色空间设施的工具。然而，GSI尚未在美国的大部分地区大规模采用，包括像佛罗里达州沿海地区这样的地区，在这些地区，现有的雨水基础设施系统在很大程度上不适应气候变化导致的洪水风险，并且经常被认为是受损水生生态系统的主要污染物负荷源。在佛罗里达州和其他地方，相对缺乏监控和性能数据、模糊的许可设计标准以及误解的维护协议都是阻碍GSI广泛应用的主要障碍。为了帮助克服这些障碍，卡纳维拉尔角有动力成为一个应用研究项目的合作伙伴和东道主，该项目全面测试了GSI干预措施的现场性能，以减轻当地严重的暴雨引发的洪水和非点营养负荷问题。全面实施项目的主要研究目标包括表征雨水渗透速率-容量，区域营养负荷减少性能，以及GSI系统作为市政设施的公众评估。预计研究结果将促进在濒危的印度河泻湖流域（拥有150万人口，通常被描述为北美生物多样性最丰富的河口）开展更多的GSI研究和采用，并广泛影响全球城市化沿海社区GSI监测实践的演变。该项目是对“公民创新挑战”项目（track a）的回应：在不断变化的气候中生活：围绕适应、恢复和缓解的灾前行动——是国家科学基金会、国土安全部和能源部之间的合作项目。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，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。

This project plans to establish an urban hydrology monitoring network within the City of Cape Canaveral, Florida, through a participatory charrette process. Like many coastal communities, Cape Canaveral is confronted with the stressors of growing flood risk and harmful algal blooms in nearshore waters. A combination of antiquated infrastructure in the built environment and accelerating climate change is amplifying the impacts of both urban flooding and algal blooms, resulting in increasing threats to public safety, ecosystem health, and private property. The Cape Canaveral municipal government, in collaboration with its academic and community partners, is planning to design, implement, monitor, and assess nature-based green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) as an approach for mitigating these current and future stressors. This GSI monitoring network will provide important benefits for Cape Canaveral and the broader Indian River Lagoon watershed of eastern Florida, while also demonstrating opportunities for optimizing and assessing GSI performance in similarly vulnerable coastal locations. GSI refers to a set of stormwater management practices that are designed to maintain, restore, and/or mimic pre-development hydrologic conditions within built environments. These practices are being increasingly promoted as a tool for reducing flood risk, improving water quality, enhancing urban habitat, and creating valuable green space amenities. However, GSI has not yet been adopted at scale in much of the U.S., including areas – like much of coastal Florida – where existing stormwater infrastructure systems are largely maladapted to climate change-driven flood risks and often identified as a primary pollutant load source into impaired aquatic ecosystems. A relative lack of monitoring and performance data, ambiguous permitting design standards, and misunderstood maintenance protocols are all commonly cited as key barriers to the wider application of GSI, in Florida and elsewhere. To help overcome these barriers, Cape Canaveral is motivated to serve as a partner and host for an applied research program that comprehensively tests the field performance of GSI interventions for mitigating locally severe stormwater-based flooding and non-point nutrient load issues. Key research goals for the fully implemented project include characterization of stormwater infiltration rate-capacity, areal nutrient-load reduction performance, and public valuation of GSI systems as a municipal amenity. Results are anticipated to facilitate greater GSI research and adoption in the imperiled Indian River Lagoon watershed, home to 1.5 million people and often described as the most biodiverse estuary in North America, and broadly impact the evolution of GSI monitoring practices in urbanized coastal communities across the world. This project is in response to the Civic Innovation Challenge program—Track A. Living in a changing climate: pre-disaster action around adaptation, resilience, and mitigation—and is a collaboration between NSF, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Department of Energy.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.