Upcoming Events
Topic: A Blueprint for Improving Waterway Management
Presenter: Glenn Browning – Civil Engineer at Healthy Land and Water
Date: Thursday 9th July 2020
Time: 1.00pm – 1.45pm
Description: Glenn’s presentation will be on the recently released SPP Review – A Blueprint for Improving Waterway Management. This is an informal document, whose purpose is to prompt discussion and interest regarding future recommended improvements to the State Planning Policy (SPP) – Water Quality State Interest. While SPP amendments are just part of the solution, complimentary recommendations have also been made to improve waterway management more broadly.
The Blueprint for Improving Waterway Management is based on foundational research by Alluvium as well as interviews with many key stakeholders in the stormwater industry. The document proposes 12 strategies across three themes: Protect, Maintain and Enhance. This paper was sponsored by the Department of Environment and Science and is for discussion purposes only. You can directly download the document here.
Topic: Why we should change what the guidelines, codes and specifications say about Manning’s n in the design of grass-lined and rock-lined channels
Presenters: Martin Jacobs – Principal Hydraulics Engineer at Pitt&Sherry
Date: Thursday 23rd July 2020
Time: 1.00pm – 1:45pm
Description: Most guidelines, codes and specifications include tables of fixed Manning’s n values for different types of channels. A few include references to vegetal retardance types, but these are rarely used in practice. It is rarely recognised that Manning’s n varies with depth and that the values used for shallow flow should be much higher than deep flow. This often results in the adoption of inappropriate, low values in the design of shallow grass-lined and rock-lined channels such that the resulting channels could be one third, one quarter or one fifth the size required to convey the design flow. The dynamics of design-and-construct procurement of infrastructure pressure designers into adopting the most favourable, lowest possible value of Manning’s n, which are justified by placing onerous maintenance burdens (mowing) on asset owners.
There are established techniques to estimate the values of Manning’s n for grass-lined and rock-lined channels, based on the underlying theory and empirical experiments. Although they are tedious to work out manually, they can be completed computationally and Martin has developed a program.
By re-writing the codes, guidelines and specifications to recognise the depth-varying nature of Manning’s n, not only will there be better outcomes for design, but also asset owners can balance the competing demands of capital costs and maintenance and continuity can be achieved with water sensitive urban design, which favours the use of grass-lined channels with low velocities.
Registration: This webinar is FREE of charge to all. Follow the link below to register:
Hosted by Stormwater Queensland and Stormwater Victoria, and sponsored by Wave Maintenance.
Topic: WSUD audit, maintenance and rectification insights for assets 5-15 years old.
Presenters: Ralf Pfleiderer – Director at Wave Maintenance
Date: Thursday 17 September 2020
Time: 12.30pm – 1:30pm
Description: This seminar will cover a range of design and construction suggestions gleaned from years of observation and auditing systems, and more recently of maintaining and rectifying raingardens, tree pits and biofilters as part of stormwater harvesting systems. Over the last two years, as director of the new WSUD maintenance company, Wave Maintenance based in Melbourne, Ralf Pfleiderer has been getting up close and personal with mainly assets, doing monthly and quarterly cleaning. This gives you a great insight into how quickly inlets block and sediment accumulates. Over the last two months Wave Maintenance have also rectified over 60 assets ranging in design styles, ages, catchments types and maintenance regimes. The seminar will present aspects that make maintenance easy (and therefore the assets perform well), what designs reduce failure and blockages and what not to do again in the future.
Registration: This webinar is FREE of charge to all.
About The Presenter: Ralf Pfleiderer is a well-respected leader in stormwater across Australia, with over 20 years’ experience in the industry, across public and private enterprise. Ralf is an Environmental Engineer applying his engineering skills within a landscape, green infrastructure and open space context. Ralf has been involved in delivering all stages of WSUD assets from policy to design, undertaking or managing the construction and maintenance to monitoring and auditing a range of large and small WSUD assets for local governments, Melbourne Water and developers. Ralf runs his own consulting practice as well as being a hands-on director at Wave Maintenance.
Topic: Enhancing the Ability of the Agricultural Landscape to Remove Nitrogen: Lessons Learnt
Presenters: Dr Mark Bailey – Director / Senior Scientist at AWC
Date: Thursday 1 October 2020
Time: 1.00pm – 1:45pm
Description: The long-term protection of the Great Barrier Reef requires a co-ordinated and multi-faceted campaign across the atmosphere, ocean and land draining into the GBR. On land, the diffuse movement of sediment, nutrients and pesticides from both the urban and agricultural catchments have been reported to impact the resilience of the reef systems themselves.
While the quality of water draining from the GBR catchments has been extensively measured/modelled, the actual water quality ‘problem’ at the local scale is not well defined. As such, the solution to decreasing the sediment, nutrient and pesticide loads to the GBR in not well understood.
For the past 10 years AWC have been involved in the developed of many strategies for intercepting nitrates and sediments within the agricultural landscape – two priority pollutants for maintaining reef health. This has been a challenging but rewarding experience collaborating with landholders and other stakeholders to develop pragmatic and workable solutions in response to different landholder needs within the individual catchment/farm context.
This webinar will relate the technical and engagement methods employed, outcomes achieved and the mistakes made and how we hope these to assist in the future planning, design and implementation of water quality improvement projects across the agricultural sector. Addressing the challenges facing the GBR requires a significant scaling up of efforts to improve farm and catchment-based management of water quality with input from a broad range of industry bodies, government and non-government organisations, the scientific community and most importantly the farming community. This webinar is intended to assist and guide the many people required to contribute to this effort.
Registration: This webinar is FREE of charge to all. Follow the link below to register:
Topic: Challenging the current Queensland regulatory framework for rainwater tanks
Presenter: Daniel Niven, Principal Water Engineer at Engeny Water Management
Date: Thursday 15 October 2020
Time: 1.00pm – 1.45pm
More Details Coming Soon!
Topic: Let’s stop putting stormwater detention in stupid places
Presenters: Dr Rodney Ronalds – Friends Civil Engineering
Date: Thursday 29 October 2020
Time: 1pm – 1:45pm
Description: Stormwater detention is commonly mandated by local Council’s for all new development sites, regardless of their location in the regional catchment. It is also common for engineers to specify stormwater detention using an isolated assessment of peak runoff at the lawful point of discharge of a site only, without considering the surrounding catchments and watercourses.
The first part of this webinar will cover recent research that conclusively shows that detention in the lower parts of regional catchments (where all of our cities are) can cause increased regional runoff and flood probability. Equations will be presented that can be used to calculate the increase/decrease in regional peak runoff that results from urbanisation with/without OSD at varying locations in the regional catchment. The equations are simple and easy to use, with basic inputs requiring a few measurements of catchment areas and stream lengths.
The second part of this presentation will look at some significant rainfall events that occurred early in this year and exceeded the infamous 1% AEP. The actual recorded rainfall patterns over the regional catchments have been modelled to test the equations response to real rainfall.
The third part of this presentation will respond to some of the feedback that the original study has received from industry experts. One of the main topics from reviewers has been the spatial variance of rainfall (what happens if it only rains in part of the regional catchment or the rainfall is not equal over the catchment). A method for randomly distributing rainfall over the catchment as part of a monte-carlo simulation technique in a hydrologic model will be described to address these reviewers’ concerns.
Lastly, a discussion from the audience will be encouraged. Stories involving projects with stormwater detention at inappropriate locations, and any strategies for driving policy change will be greatly welcomed.
Registration: This webinar is FREE of charge to all.
Hosted by Stormwater Queensland & IECA
Topic: Erosion and Sediment Control in Queensland – Changes Design Engineers need to be made aware of.
Presenters: Kyle Robson –Managing Director at Topo
Date: Thursday, November 26, 2020
Time: 1pm – 1:45pm
Description: In 2017, the Queensland government updated the State Planning Policy (SPP). The SPP included some significant changes in how Erosion and Sediment Controls are to be designed and managed. Based on a review of Erosion and Sediment Control plans being submitted with Operational Works drawings, it is clear many design Engineers are not complying with the new requirements. This leads to confusion for contractors during tendering and risk of incorrect budgeting or expectations for all involved in the project.
This webinar will provide a simplistic overview of what the changes are, what this looks like and where individuals or companies can find resources to help them transition designs to comply with legislative requirements. The session is focused at Engineers, individuals and companies preparing designs for the urban development sector and will also include a Q&A session where attendees can ask any questions they have on the changes or design process.
This is a joint webinar by Stormwater Queensland and the International Erosion Control Association.
This event may attract CPD points. Please contact your relevant professional Institute or industry organisation to confirm.
Registration: This webinar is FREE of charge to all.
Topic: The private experience of managing stormwater quality
Presenter: Ruby Ardren, Project Leader – Water Management @Northern Beaches Council
Date: Thursday 11 March 2021
Time: 1pm – 1:45pm
Description:
Water Cycle Management Officer, Ruby Ardren, will introduce you to the results of her recent exploratory study completed for a Masters of Research, which identified that stormwater quality improvement devices on private property were not being maintained or even retained.
Ruby will provide a brief (approximately 20-minutes) presentation, followed by Q&A with attendees. Attendance will contribute to the CPD of attendees.
Registration: This webinar is FREE of charge to all.
Hosted by Stormwater QLD & Stormwater NSW and sponsored by 
This webinar will be presented by Aditya Singh, a Senior Water Resources Engineer at KCB. Last year, Aditya was part of a project within the Research Development and Innovation (RDI) scheme managed by the Queensland Water Modelling Network (QWMN). As part of the project, he has looked at using a distributed catchment model to improve representation of catchment scale processes and linkages to finer scale hydrodynamic models. The project also saw the use of PEST for parameter estimation and a hybridisation approach involving some machine learning methods to predict water quality.
The webinar will include a short (approximately 20-minute) presentation by Aditya, followed by Q&A.
Registration: This webinar is FREE of charge to all.
Hosted by Stormwater Queensland and Stormwater New South Wales
Topic: WSUD asset management requirements for new development – legislation, development and compliance
Presenters:
Dr Andrew Thomas – Vice President – Stormwater NSW
Daniel Rider –WSUD Compliance Officer at Blacktown City Council
Date: Wednesday 9 June, 2021
Time: 1pm – 1:45pm
Description: In 2012, Blacktown City Council established a Water Sensitive Urban Design Compliance Program. A first of its kind in Australia, the Program aims to increase compliance with legal requirements for the management of privately-owned water sensitive urban design assets in the Council area. This webinar will provide an overview of the Program as well as a project that seeks to improve its capacity to increase compliance with legal requirements. It may offer important insights for local authorities in New South Wales and Queensland seeking to establish their own compliance programs and initiatives.
This is a free webinar provided in collaboration between Stormwater Queensland and Stormwater NSW. Attendance will contribute to the CPD of attendees.
Registration: This webinar is FREE of charge to all.
