Laboratory Exercises and Field
Measurements in Environmental
Engineering
By: Ali Torabi Haghighi
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Laboratory Exercises and Field Measurements in
Environmental(488118S )
The Laboratory Exercises and Field measurement in Environmental
Engineering course is composed of 5 different modules:
Geotechnical engineering, Site investigation and field
measurement; Hydraulics; Groundwater; and Water and
wastewater treatment. It is strongly recommended that before
undertaken this course the student should acquire basic knowledge
in the fields of geotechnical engineering, hydraulics, ground water
engineering, water and wastewater treatment processes. At the
University of Oulu these knowledge is provided by the following
courses:
• 488106A Basics in environmental geotechnics;
• 488108S Groundwater engineering;
• 488113S Hydraulics for environmental engineering;
• 488110S Water and wastewater treatment;
• 488115S Advanced environmental engineering.
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Schedule:
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Modules:
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Module1: Site investigation and field measurement
Module2: Fluid mechanics and open channel hydraulics
Module3: Ground water engineering
Module4: Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Module5: water and waste water engineering
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Module 2 : Fluid mechanics and open channel hydraulics
• Fluid mechanics contains (water discharge, Momentum
equation, Bernoulli’s equation )
• Open channel hydraulics contains (Different methods for
measuring flowrate, weirs, gates, Hydraulic jump and...)
• work with data logger
• Tracer test
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Module 3: Ground water engineering
• Soil parameters (Hydraulic conductivity (K), specific
yield (S), porosity (n) and PF )
• Darcy low and Groundwater flow
• Contaminant transport
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Module 4: Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering
Sieving
Soil
classification
Hydrometer
Liquid limit
Etterberg
Limits
Plastic limit
Geotechnical
Tests
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Soil
improvment
Compaction
(proctor )
Soil streght
Direct shear
box
Cnosolidation
Eodeometer
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Module 5: Water and waste water engineering
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Jar test experiment
Settling velocity
Limestone (CaCO3) filtration
Aeration
Determination of Fe, Cl-, Mn
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Module1: Site investigation and field measurement
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Work with GPS
Surveying and prepare a topography map
Soil sampeling
Water sampeling
Calculate water velocity and discharge
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Course assessment
• Participate in lectures and prepare the assignments (20 %)
• Quiz (15%)
• Participate in lab and field activities(20 %)
• Prepare report(%40)
You get points of report if you participate in field and lab
activites and pass the quize
If you participate on more than 85% of course schedule,
you can recieve 10 credit points when you collect
sufficient points from all 5 modules
If you participate between 40-85 % of course you can
recieve 5 credit points when you collect sufficient
points from different modules(at least 3 modules)
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How to Write a Lab Report
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Lab reports are an essential part of all
laboratory courses and usually a
significant part of your grade.
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Title Page
Title
Introduction / Purpose
Materials
Methods
calculation
Results
Discussion or Analysis
Resources of error
Conclusions
Figures , Graphs and table
References
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Units of measurement
• A unit of measurement is a definite
magnitude of a physical quantity, defined and
adopted by convention and/or by law, that is
used as a standard for measurement of the
same physical quantity
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SI Vs. Imperial system
SI
•
Imperial System
The International System of Units (abbreviated SI
from the French Le Système International d'Unités)
is the modern form of the metric system and is
generally a system of units of measurement
devised around seven base units and the
convenience of the number ten. It is the world's
most widely used system of measurement, both in
everyday commerce and in science. The older
metric system included several groups of units.
The SI was developed in 1960 from the old meterkilogram-second system, rather than the
centimeter-gram-second system, which, in turn,
had a few variants. Because the SI is not static,
units are created and definitions are modified
through international agreement among many
nations as the technology of measurement
progresses, and as the precision of measurements
improves.
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•
Imperial units or the imperial
system is a system of units, first
defined in the British Weights and
Measures Act of 1824, later
refined (until 1959) and reduced.
The system came into official use
across the British Empire. By the
late 20th century most nations of
the former empire had officially
adopted the metric system as their
main system of measurement.
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Prefix
• A prefix may be added to a unit to produce a multiple of the original
unit. All multiples are integer powers of ten. For example, kilo- denotes
a multiple of a thousand and mille- denotes a multiple of a thousandth;
hence there are one thousand millimeters to the meter and one thousand
meters to the kilometer. The prefixes are never combined: a millionth of
a kilogram is a milligram not a micro kilogram
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Errors
• Any measurement includes errors, we can never
find the true value, we can find the best estimate of
the measured quantity.
• Types of Errors:
1. Gross Errors (Mistakes): Large amounts, easy to find, must be
eliminated before adjustment.
2. Systematic errors: Follow a mathematical function, can usually
be checked and adjusted, and tend to maintain same sign
3. Random Errors: remains after eliminating gross and systematic
errors. Impossible to compute or eliminate. They follow the
probability laws, so they can be adjusted Their signs are not
constant. Present in all surveying measurements.
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Mistake
• Mistakes. Entirely distinct from errors, in the sense
heretofore used, are those inaccuracies which are due
purely to carelessness, and which should properly be
called mistakes.
They consist in such blunders as reading the wrong
number on the scale, reading one number and putting
another down in the notes, making a miscount in timing
and lost some steps
Mistakes are usually easily detected, and there is no
remedy except careful checking. When measurements
are made more than once the checking is a simple
matter.
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Random vs. Systematic Error
• Random errors:
• in
experimental
measurements are caused
by
unknown
and
unpredictable changes in
the experiment. These
changes may occur in the
measuring instruments or
in the environmental
conditions.
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• Systematic
errors
in
experimental observations
usually come from the
measuring
instruments.
They may occur because:
there is something wrong
with the instrument or its
data handling system, or
because the instrument is
wrongly used by the
experimenter.
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Example of systematic error
• You want measure a 425 meters length with a 50
meters measuring tape.
This device has +10 cm systematic error
It means in each times measuring you
record 50 meters but in real you measure
49.90 meter finally you have 425+8.5
*.10meters (425.85) in your record inset
of 425 meters
In real
But museaure
49.90 49.90
50.00
49.90
50.00 50.00
49.90
50.00
425.8517
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49.90
50.00
- 425.0 =
49.90
50.00
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49.90
50.00
49.90 25.8
50.00
25.8517
.8517 meters error
Precision vs. Accuracy
• Precision:"The precision
of a measurement refers
to how close to one
another these repeated
measurements are.“
• Accuracy:"The accuracy
of
a
series
of
measurements is the
closeness of their average
value to a true value."
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Probability
• Error analysis involve random errors only.
• Random errors occurrence is governed by the
probability laws, as any random phenomena.
• The most probable value of a single quantity
observed many times under the same condition is
the mean
M=

Oi
n
Residuals: the difference between any observation and it’s most
probable value: vi = M - Oi
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Error Distribution
• Random errors are randomly distributed, a bell shape
distribution that is approximated by the probability curve.
• General Laws of Probability:
– small errors occur more often than large ones
– Positive and negative errors of the same size happen
with equal frequency, they are equally probable. That is
why the mean is the most probable value.
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Measures of Precision
• standard deviation is the most frequently used measure of precision. The less
precise the observations are, the larger the standard deviation becomes
2
v
 
n 1
• The standard deviation is the inflection point of the curve, it represents how
much the observations are close to each other.
• It has a probability of 68.27. That means 68.27 of the observations will be in
the range of
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CALIBRATION
• Calibration
is
a
comparison
between
measurements - one of
known magnitude or
correctness made or set
with one device and
another
measurement
made in as similar a
way as possible with a
second device.
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Thanks
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