Abstract
Improving the rainwater retention capacity (RRC) of green roofs has been proposed as an important component of urban stormwater management. In this study, a two-layered soil green roof model was established to enhance RRC compared to each single soil column model. The hydrological process of layered soil green roofs was simulated using the HYDRUS-1D program, with simulation results verified by measured results. The results showed that the RRC of the layered soil was 5% and 1% higher than that of each single substrate under a long-term dry-wet cycle and increased by 15% and 11% per event compared with the single substrates. In addition, higher peak drainage reduction and longer peak drainage delay were observed in the layered soil green roof compared to each single soil. The layered soil slowed the movement of the soil wetting front and increased the maximum water content of the upper soil. The water loss of the layered soil was reduced after rainfall and mainly occurred in the lower layer of the layered soil. These results suggest that the structures of green roofs with an upper layer with higher permeability and a lower layer with lower permeability have better hydrological performance.
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All data generated or analyzed during this study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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Acknowledgments
We greatly appreciated the professional comments and advice of the anonymous reviewers.
Funding
This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 51878185) and the China Scholarship Council (CSC) (Grant No. 201906660001)
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection, and analysis were performed by Jun Wang, Shan Huang, and Tiancheng Wang. Project administration, methodology, and writing—review and editing were performed by Ankit Garg, Zhiwen WU, and Guoxiong Mei. The initial draft of the manuscript was written by Jun Wang, and all the authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Wang, ., Garg, A., Huang, S. et al. An experimental and numerical investigation of the mechanism of improving the rainwater retention of green roofs with layered soil. Environ Sci Pollut Res 29, 10482–10494 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-16369-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-16369-x