Dr. Bruce C. Anderson, FCSCE, Professor, Department of Civil Engineering and Cross-appointed Professor, School of Urban and Regional Planning (Department of Geography and Planning), Queen's University, Appointee, High End Foreign Expert Recruitment Program, College of Water Sciences, Beijing Normal University

Having received his Bachelor’s (Toronto 1978), and M.A.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees (British Columbia 1982 and 1989), Bruce Anderson is currently a Professor, Department of Civil Engineering, and Cross-appointed Professor, Department of Geography (School of Urban and Regional Planning) at Queen’s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada.
Bruce teaches in civil and environmental engineering, and his research focuses on natural and engineered biological systems for watershed/source water protection, with application to urban stormwater and agricultural runoff management, and small-scale wastewater treatment. Bruce is or has been a co-principal investigator in a number of research groups and he is a member and director in several national and international associations and societies (including the Canadian Society for Civil Engineering International Affairs Committee).
Bruce has built a significant China research program, and in 2005 he was a Visiting Senior Scholar at Fudan University (supported by the China-Canada Scholars Exchange Program). He has been a Visiting Professor at East China Normal University (Shanghai) and Jilin University (Changchun), and he is a co-founding member of the Fudan-Queen’s Sino-Canada Center for Environment and Sustainable Development. Through this Centre, new collaborations have been formed with China Agricultural, Tianjin, Nankai and Sichuan Agricultural universities. Bruce has given numerous invited presentations and taught 18 workshops, short- and full courses at these partner schools (with many being the first English-language courses of their kind). Research partnerships are focused on development of sustainable passive technologies as an approach to resolving China’s source water protection needs. Significant recent milestones include his appointment in the High End Foreign Expert Recruitment program (College of Water Sciences, Beijing Normal University, 2015) and his election as a Fellow of the Canadian Society for Civil Engineering (2016).

Speech Title: Innovative treatment options in agricultural areas and agri-food industries for sustainable source water protection

Abstract
It is now widely acknowledged that diffuse (non-point) loading of nutrients from agricultural fields is a leading cause of water quality problems in freshwater lakes in North America and around the world. In humid growing areas (the province of Quebec, Canada as an example), the use of subsurface tile drainage systems is common practice to achieve ideal field moisture and growing conditions; unfortunately these drains also function to channel water (and the consequent fertilizer nutrient load) quickly away to the nearest surface stream, river and/or lake, resulting in the recent proliferation of toxic algae blooms, the growth of hypoxic (low oxygen) zones in lakes, and general water quality deterioration. Interestingly, the location and function of these drains also presents an excellent opportunity for the application of innovative applied treatment, since the formerly diffuse discharges are turned into point-sources by the drains, which in turn can serve as the influent sources for applied treatment systems.
A long-term ongoing research effort based in Quebec is examining the design, implementation, performance assessment and modelling of innovative passive end-of-field treatment systems to control the loading of the common nutrients nitrogen and phosphorus to freshwater lakes, in a watershed based approach to protect (and restore) lakes from accelerated eutrophication. These systems mirror the nutrient management approaches of conventional wastewater treatment processes, but do so in a sustainable decentralized manner appropriate to watershed-wide application in agricultural settings. Using environmental criteria targets for nutrient loadings into freshwater systems (of <0.03 mg/L total phosphorus and <0.160 mg/L nitrate-nitrogen), the project is examining application of stand-alone wood-chip denitrifying bioreactors (for nitrogen control) and sorptive media reactors (for phosphorus control), as well as the combination of both systems into an integrated treatment train. Recent results suggest nutrient load reductions of up to 99% for nitrate and 80% for phosphorus, and these systems are being refined in an on-going effort to achieve the environmental criteria targets. Full details about these systems (history, design and operation) will be described in this presentation.
In parallel with this field-based program, we are also examining the application of wood-chip denitrifying bioreactors separately and integrated with salt accumulating wetland plant species to treat the discharges from greenhouse food production. With the consequences of climate change, greenhouse-based food production will become more common in future. With that growth (typically in unserviced rural areas) will come increased requirements to treat the effluents before discharge to surface rivers and lakes, or before recycling of the effluent as irrigation water in water conservation strategies. While each effluent will be specific to the crop grown, it can be generally stated that these effluents pose unique challenges for treatment, with high nutrient and salt content from the applied fertilizers and low organic content. As such, the conventional approaches for wastewater treatment (physical, chemical and/or biological processes) won’t be appropriate or successful, particularly in areas without access to ample electricity to run these conventional processes. The application of the passive denitrifying and salt-accumulating bioreactors is therefore viewed as an appropriate and sustainable technology for this particular agri-food industry, and this presentation will summarize the results of three years of pilot-scale studies in which we have evaluated operational factors (hydraulics and effective porosity, nutrient loading and acclimatization requirements including reactor seeding), different salt accumulating plant species appropriate for application in our climate zone, and the performance and microbiology of the wood-chip bioreactors.
Conventional municipal ‘big pipe’ collection, conveyance and treatment systems will not be successful in addressing the emerging need for treatment of agricultural or agri-food discharges, and this research program is generating the important operation and design information for the use, on a watershed-scale, of passive and innovative treatment systems which will provide sustainable source protection for freshwater systems.

Acknowledgements: The research program is supported by a number of grants and contracts from the national Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, NSERC, as well as from private sources.