Integrating biochar and native vegetation to maximize ecosystem services and their return-on-investment in a storm water management facility

在加拿大和北美大部分地区，市政当局在法律上要求所有新开发项目都要建造雨水管理设施（SWMF），在排入下水道系统并最终进入自然水体之前，将所有社区径流收集起来。住宅发展swmf减少景观水流和污染到邻近社区高达80%。然而，由于SWMF流出的水在进入下游之前没有经过处理，因此在SWMF水中捕获的污染物被转移到自然生态系统中。这已被发现对下游环境、市政当局及其公民产生各种负面影响。生物炭和生物多样性降低了向下游转移的污染物水平。该项目对重建生态系统中生物炭的最佳应用水平提出了三个问题：什么水平的生物炭能最大限度地提高原生植被的建立成功率；它是否也最大化了对入侵物种的抑制？这是否与植物和土壤中土壤有机碳、氮和/或磷的储存相关，从而显著减少下游污染水流。该项目的成果将为制定协议和指导方针提供重要信息，以最大限度地提高城市系统的水质，保护自然水体和下游的加拿大人。本研究与工业合作伙伴相关，因为研究结果将指导他们设计swmf以最小化成本并最大化此类设施的生态功能。这项研究的结果也将适用于所有加拿大北方生物群落SWMF和其他新兴的省和地区法规。

Across Canada - and much of North America - municipalities legally require all new developments to constructstorm water management facilities (SWMF) that accumulate all neighbourhood runoff water prior to drainageinto sewer systems and eventually natural water bodies. Residential development SWMFs reduce landscapewater flow and contamination into neighbouring communities by up to 80%. However, because SWMFoutflow is not treated prior to farther downstream entry, pollutants captured in SWMF water is transferred tonatural ecosystems. This has been found to have a variety of negative impacts on downstream environments,municipalities and their citizens. Globally and individually biochar and biodiversity have reduced pollutantlevels transferred downstream. This project has three questions about the optimal level of biochar applicationin rebuilt ecosystems: what level of biochar maximizes native vegetation establishment success; does it alsomaximize invasive species inhibition; and is this correlated to soil organic carbon, nitrogen and/or phosphorusstorage in the plants and soils to a level that can significantly reduce downstream pollutant water flow. Theoutcomes of this project will provide vital information needed to create protocols and guidelines to maximizethe water quality delivered from urban systems to protect natural water bodies and Canadians downstream.This research is relevant to the industrial partner as results from the research will guide their design of SWMFto minimize the cost and maximize the ecological function of such facilities. Results from this study will alsobe applicable across all Canadian boreal biome SWMF and other emerging provincial and territorialregulations.