Large contribution from anthropogenic warming to an emerging North American megadrought.

Severe and persistent 21st-century drought in southwestern North America (SWNA) motivates comparisons to medieval megadroughts and questions about the role of anthropogenic climate change. We use hydrological modeling and new 1200-year tree-ring reconstructions of summer soil moisture to demonstrate that the 2000-2018 SWNA drought was the second driest 19-year period since 800 CE, exceeded only by a late-1500s megadrought. The megadrought-like trajectory of 2000-2018 soil moisture was driven by natural variability superimposed on drying due to anthropogenic warming. Anthropogenic trends in temperature, relative humidity, and precipitation estimated from 31 climate models account for 47% (model interquartiles of 35 to 105%) of the 2000-2018 drought severity, pushing an otherwise moderate drought onto a trajectory comparable to the worst SWNA megadroughts since 800 CE.

Precipitation, temperature, and teleconnection signals across the combined North American, Monsoon Asia, and Old World Drought Atlases.

The tree-ring-based North American Drought Atlas (NADA), Monsoon Asia Drought Atlas (MADA), and Old World Drought Atlas (OWDA) collectively yield a near-hemispheric gridded reconstruction of hydroclimate variability over the last millennium. To test the robustness of the large-scale representation of hydroclimate variability across the drought atlases, the joint expression of seasonal climate variability and teleconnections in the NADA, MADA, and OWDA are compared against two global, observation-based PDSI products. Predominantly positive (negative) correlations are determined between seasonal precipitation (surface air temperature) and collocated tree-ring-based PDSI, with average Pearson's correlation coefficients increasing in magnitude from boreal winter to summer. For precipitation, these correlations tend to be stronger in the boreal winter and summer when calculated for the observed PDSI record, while remaining similar for temperature. Notwithstanding these differences, the drought atlases robustly express teleconnection patterns associated with the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), and Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO). These expressions exist in the drought atlas estimates of boreal summer PDSI despite the fact that these modes of climate variability are dominant in boreal winter, with the exception of the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation. ENSO and NAO teleconnection patterns in the drought atlases are particularly consistent with their well-known dominant expressions in boreal winter and over the OWDA domain, respectively. Collectively, our findings confirm that the joint Northern Hemisphere drought atlases robustly reflect large-scale patterns of hydroclimate variability on seasonal to multidecadal timescales over the 20th century and are likely to provide similarly robust estimates of hydroclimate variability prior to the existence of widespread instrumental data.

Simultaneous nitrification and denitrification of municipal wastewater in aerobic membrane bioreactors.

Simultaneous nitrification-denitrification (SND) of municipal wastewater was investigated in a laboratory-scale membrane bioreactor (MBR) operated at two different hydraulic retention times (HRTs), 0.5 and 1 day, dissolved oxygen 3.0 to 0.5 mg/L, and solids retention time (SRT) between 28 and 120 days. The organic loading rate (OLR) (0.11 to 0.64 kg chemical oxygen demand [COD]/m3/d) and influent soluble COD (SCOD)/ total Kjeldahl nitrogen (TKN) ratio (5 to 19) were varied by the addition of glucose. The ammonia-nitrogen and TKN removals were over 97%, and total nitrogen removal was approximately 89% in the MBR. The maximum specific nitrification rates (98 mg N/d/g VSS) and specific denitrification rates (81 mg N/d/g VSS) occurred at an SCOD/TKN ratio of 9.1. The optimum conditions for maximum total nitrogen removal by SND in a single reactor MBR have been found to be low dissolved oxygen (< 0.6 mg/L) and high OLR (approximately 0.64 kg COD/m3/d) at an HRT of 0.5 day and SRT of approximately 85 days.

Aerobic and anaerobic membrane bioreactors for municipal wastewater treatment.

An aerobic bioreactor and an anaerobic bioreactor, each coupled with a microfiltration membrane filter (MBR), were operated at different hydraulic retention times (HRTs) with primary effluent from the City of Elmhurst, Illinois, municipal-wastewater-treatment plant. The soluble chemical oxygen demand (COD) removal performance of the anaerobic MBR system was similar to that of the aerobic MBR under the same operational conditions, without the added cost of aeration. The results indicated that the solids deposition rate on the membrane surface was lower in the case of anaerobic MBR compared to the aerobic MBR, indicating possible lower loss in water-flux rates. This research found that an anaerobic MBR is a feasible and economical option for municipal-wastewater-treatment plants seeking COD removal by a biological process followed by a separate nitrification and denitrification system.