2023-2024 Course Catalog
Welcome to Virginia Tech! We are excited that you are here planning your time as a Hokie.
Welcome to Virginia Tech! We are excited that you are here planning your time as a Hokie.
Introduction to the hydrologic cycle, water resources, and related environmental issues. Emphasis on ethics and relationships between human needs for and effects upon water including: water quality, water treatment, and wastewater treatment; water for health, energy, and food; water management, laws, economics, and conflict; hydrometeorological hazards and climate change; and potential solutions for these and other critical water issues.
Study of hydrology in watersheds. Qualitative and quantitative principles of physical hydrological processes governing the movement, storage, and transformation of water on the Earths surface as influenced by watershed characteristics, including human modifications. Pre: Junior Standing
Delivery of water quality constituents from watersheds to water bodies (streams, lakes, and estuaries). Field monitoring methods to assess watershed drivers and how they affect water quality and aquatic ecosystem condition. Linkages among water quality, watershed characteristics, land use and management, and climate. Design of watershed monitoring programs to guide watershed management for protecting water quality and ecological condition of aquatic systems.
Analysis and examination of hydrologic data using basic statistics and computer programming. Calculation and interpretation of flow frequency and duration, hydrologic analysis of geospatial digital terrain data, and implementation and analysis of simple hydrologic models. Advanced methods of temporal and spatial hydrologic data visualization using computer programming.
Economic theory and methods to explain water use decisions. Efficiency, equity, and ethical considerations in U.S. water policy. Analysis of water markets, climate change, and environmental flows from diverse stakeholder perspectives.
Multidisciplinary perspectives of assessment, management and policy issues for protecting and improving watershed ecosystems. Topics include: monitoring and modeling approaches for assessment, risk-based watershed assessment geographic information systems for watershed analysis, decision support systems and computerized decision tools for watershed management, policy alternatives for watershed protection, urban watersheds, and current issues in watershed management. Pre: Two 4000 level courses in environmental/natural resource science, management, engineering, and/or policy in BSE, CEE, FOR, FREC, GEOL, LAR, CSES, ENT, BIOL, GEOG, AAEC, UAP or equivalent.
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