Within the TED2021 Rainwetpipa project, funded by PRTR funds, the team has analysed the hydraulic behaviour and purification capacity of the Tancat de la Pipa free water surface constructed wetland in the Albufera de Valencia Natural Park as it receives a mixture of urban and agricultural runoff.
According to IIAMA researcher Adrian Martinez, the results confirm that artificial wetlands act as buffer systems capable of mitigating pollution peaks and significantly improving water quality, even when they are exposed to variable pollutant loads and have not been specifically designed for those exact conditions.
The work, carried out by researchers Adrian Martinez-Biosca, Carmen Hernandez-Crespo, Enrique Asensi, Ignacio Andres-Domenech, Vicent Benedito-Dura and Miguel Martin from IIAMA-UPV, together with M. Eugenia Rodrigo-Santamalia from the Research Institute for Mediterranean Agroforestry of the UPV, examined both hydrodynamics and water quality across the wetland system.
Among the main findings, the wetland demonstrated a high retention capacity for suspended solids, with removal values approaching 80 percent of incoming material as a result of natural sedimentation processes that occur as water flows slowly through the shallow cells.
The researchers also observed a significant reduction in ammoniacal nitrogen concentrations, driven by a combination of dilution, retention in the wetland matrix and biogeochemical transformations such as nitrification, which are crucial for preventing eutrophication and protecting downstream aquatic ecosystems.
The study underlines the importance of hydraulic design in constructed wetlands, showing that configurations with multiple cells arranged in parallel can improve water residence time and treatment efficiency by distributing flows more evenly and reducing short-circuiting.
"These results provide relevant technical criteria for the design and optimisation of new green infrastructure aimed at treating contaminated water," notes IIAMA researcher Carmen Hernandez, who participated in the study.
This growing body of scientific knowledge is being transferred directly into applied projects such as VALPURIN (Development of nature-based solutions for the sustainable treatment of slurry and subsequent recovery of its fractions), funded by the Valencian Innovation Agency and involving IIAMA-UPV, Global Omnium and Servyeco.
The VALPURIN project seeks to minimise the environmental impact of agricultural waste, particularly livestock slurry, on soil and water resources by developing and validating innovative treatment trains that can recover useful fractions while reducing pollutant loads.
As part of this approach, VALPURIN is promoting the use of artificial wetlands as nature-based solutions that can transform slurry into new usable resources, supporting circular economy models in the agricultural and livestock sector and contributing to climate change mitigation efforts.
Overall, IIAMA stresses its commitment to applied research, knowledge transfer and the development of sustainable, nature-based solutions that help protect aquatic ecosystems while enabling more efficient and resilient water resource management.
Research Report: Hydrodynamic and water quality modelling of a free water surface constructed wetland for urban runoff mitigation
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