Book of Abstracts

Piloting water sensitive urban technologies in Israel; 1 st pilot in Kfar-Sava
24
Y. Zinger 1* , A. Deletic 1 , T. D. Fletcher 1 , Asher Brener 2 , T. Wong 1
1
Centre for Water Sensitive Cities, Department of Civil Engineering, Monash University, Victoria, Australia, 3800
2
Biotechnology & Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering Sciences, Ben-Gurion University of the
Negev.
* Corresponding author, e-mail yaron.zinger@monash.edu
Stormwater biofilters have been demonstrated to be effective for stormwater treatment. A dual-mode biofiltration
system has been constructed in Kfar-Sava to combine stormwater harvesting, detention and treatment during the wet
season, while being used to treat polluted aquifer groundwater (aquifer recovery) during the dry season. In addition
to demonstrating treatment effectiveness, direct and infiltration aquifer recharge solutions of the treated water were
tested to determine their performance and their relative efficiency. The results show that the system was able to
effectively treat a range of pollutants in urban runoff (heavy metals, nutrients and pathogens) and met the Israeli and
Australian guidelines for irrigation, aquifer recharge and streams health. The Kfar-Sava biofilter marked an
important milestone for implementing Water Sensitive Urban Design (WSUD) principles in Israel, while in two
years Israel will launch at least two pilot systems across the country, with the aim being to establish policies and
processes to underpin widespread adoption as part of “Creating Water Sensitive Cities in Israel” science-practice
program.
Desert Agriculture: Water and Energy Fluxes From Agricultural
Soils
One of the biggest unknown variables in desert environments is evaporation from the soil. The session
will focus on understanding and measuring evaporative processes with emphasis on agriculture in arid
regions. Topics covered will include: evaporation from porous media; separating components of
evaporation and transpiration; modeling evaporative processes; evaporation and salinity buildup; novel
methods for estimating evaporation, evaporation from heterogeneous soils; methods for minimizing
evaporative losses in agriculture.
Soil evaporation in a drip-irrigated vineyard in a desert area
Nurit Agam 1,* , Dilia Kool 1,2 , Naftali Lazarovitch 2 , Joshua L. Heitman 3 , Tom J. Sauer 4 , Alon Ben-Gal 1
1 Gilat Research Center, Agricultural Research Organization, Israel
2 French Associates Institute for Agriculture and Biotechnology of Drylands, Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert
Research, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Sede Boqer Campus, Israel
3 Department of Soil Science, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA
4 Soil, Water, and Air Resources Research Unit, USDA, ARS, AMES, IA, USA
* agam@agri.gov.il
Separating evapotranspiration into soil evaporation and canopy transpiration is challenging, but key for crops with
precise water requirements and large areas of exposed soil. Wine vineyards are planted in widely spaced rows and
require very exact water application to maximize water productivity, as well as to enhance fruit quality by allowing
moderate levels of stress during certain phenological stages. Minimization of soil evaporation, which is an
unproductive use of water, is an important strategy for maximizing water productivity. However, active actions in
this direction are worth investment only if the fraction of soil evaporation is significant. The objective of this
research was to quantify soil evaporation in a drip-irrigated vineyard under arid conditions with a specific focus on
its spatial and temporal variations along the inter-row.
The experiment was conducted in an isolated commercial desert vineyard planted in a north-south row orientation,
with a mean annual precipitation of 90 mm. Continuous measurements above the canopy included
evapotranspiration, solar radiation, air temperature and humidity. Short-term intensive measurements below the