About

Douglas A Haith is an Emeritus Professor in the Department of Biological and Environmental Engineering. His research in water resources and environmental engineering is based on mathematical modeling related to nonpoint source pollution. His recent research involves the development and application of mathematical models to aid in the management of environmental pollution. These models are tested with field data and implemented in software packages that are made available to practicing engineers and other environmental professionals. Professor Haith is currently teaching two upper-level courses: BEE 4750 Environmental Systems Analysis and BEE 4760 Solid Waste Engineering.

Research topics

• Environmental science
• Environmental engineering
• Water resource management
• Computer science
• Business

Selected publications

• Extreme event analysis of pesticide loads to surface waters

  2016-01-01 · 4 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  Surface water pollution by pesticide runoff is influenced by random hydrologie events. Risk assessment of such pollution is based on estimates of the probabilities of large or extreme pes ticide runoff loads. A previous paperl described a general Monte Carlo simulation approach for generating pesticide runoff esti mates. The approach was used to determine mean annual pes ticide loads and probability distributions of annual and monthly loads for two pesticides in Georgia and Iowa. However, annual and monthly loads may understate the severity of a pesticide pollution problem, particularly for streams or small rivers. A large runoff even may produce a sudden shock load of chemical which severely impacts aquatic life. Risk assessment of these situations requires probabilities estimates of short-term (daily) pesticide runoff. This paper extends the Monte Carlo approach to the analysis of daily pesticide runoff. The work has three objectives: to il lustrate Monte Carlo simulation to produce information for pesticide pollution risk assessment; to estimate the magnitudes of extreme pesticide runoff events for a range of chemicals and locations; and to determine the general forms of probability dis tributions for annual and monthly maximum daily pesticide runoff loads.

  Publisher

• Environmental Systems Analysis - Penn State, University Park

  Digital Commons - USU (Utah State University) · 2014-01-01

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Undergraduate course in environmental systems analysis offered at Penn State, University Park in Fall 2014.

  Publisher

• Volatilization of Pesticides from Golf Courses in the United States: Mass Fluxes and Inhalation Health Risks

  Journal of Environmental Quality · 2013-09-13 · 12 citations

  articleSenior author

  Golfers may be subject to chronic health risks from inhalation of vapors from pesticides applied to turf surfaces. The objective of this study was to provide a comprehensive evaluation of the volatilization potential of pesticides used on golf courses in the United States and to assess the resulting inhalation health risks. Long-term exposures were simulated using a fate and transport model for inhaled concentrations. The model was tested using data from field experiments for eight pesticides. Mean concentrations were overestimated by a factor of two, and the model explained 82% of observed variations. The model was subsequently used to estimate volatilization mass fluxes and air concentrations for 37 chemicals using weather information from nine climatic zones in the United States. Simulation results indicated substantial regional variations in volatilization fluxes, concentrations, and health risks, largely due to weather and pesticide application variations. Hazard quotients associated with chronic noncarcinogenic health risks were found to be less than 10 for all chemicals and locations. Similarly, carcinogenic health risks for the 10 pesticides considered likely or possible carcinogens were determined to be less than 10. Based on currently available levels of chronic toxicity endpoints for human health (chronic reference doses and cancer potency factors), we could find no evidence of health risk to golfers from inhalation of these 37 pesticides.

  PublisherDOI

• Nutrient Loads to Cayuga Lake, New York: Watershed Modeling on a Budget

  Journal of Water Resources Planning and Management · 2012-09-01 · 13 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  Nutrient loads were estimated for the 34 watersheds draining into Cayuga Lake, New York, through use of a watershed model. Financial and human resources were very limited for the project, but significant cost savings were achieved through project decisions. Chief among these were selection of a watershed model that did not require calibration and use of historic water quality monitoring data for model testing. Savings were also obtained by extrapolating soil properties from related information (nutrient contents from organic matter), substituting literature concentrations for missing point source data, extrapolating septic system performance from one area to another, and use of synthetic weather data generated from a model. None of the decisions was remarkable in itself, but together, they permitted a watershed study and its associated modeling to be accomplished with modest resources.

  PublisherDOI

• National Assessment of Pesticide Runoff Loads from Grass Surfaces

  Journal of Environmental Engineering · 2011-09-01

  article1st authorCorresponding

  Pesticide runoff loads from grass surfaces were estimated through simulation experiments for 37 chemicals registered for use on U.S. lawns and golf courses. Simulation runs were made for each chemical and surface (lawns, greens, fairways) using 100-year weather records generated for nine U.S. cities. Results were summarized as mean annual and 1-in-10 year annual maximum daily pesticide loads. These loads varied greatly with pesticide, grass surface, and city, ranging from less than one to over 400 g/ha for mean annual loads and from less than one to over 500 g/ha for 1-in-10 year maximum daily loads. Mean annual loads averaged over the 37 chemicals and three grass surfaces were found to be closely related to growing season precipitation. Variations among the nine cities were well-captured by three general climate categories: humid, represented by Atlanta and Houston; mesic, as with Albany, Columbus, Madison, and Olympia; and dry, represented by Bismarck, Fresno, and Roswell. Mean annual pesticide runoff was 19, 6, and 2 g/ha in the humid, mesic, and dry regions, respectively.

  PublisherDOI

• Ecological Risk Assessment of Pesticide Runoff from Grass Surfaces

  Environmental Science & Technology · 2010-07-28 · 40 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  An ecological risk assessment was performed for runoff of 37 pesticides registered for use on grass surfaces (lawns and golf courses) in the U.S. The assessment was based on 100-yr simulations using TPQPond, a newly developed model of pesticide runoff and subsequent accumulation in a receiving pond. One-in-10 yr pond concentrations were compared with acute toxicity end points for fish, invertebrates, and algae. Simulations were performed for pesticides applied at label rates on lawns, fairways, and greens using weather data for nine U.S. locations. Runoff of 4 of the 37 pesticides produced potential acute risk to invertebrates or fish. Two chemicals posed a comparable danger to plants. Risk was highest with fairways and lowest for greens. Locations with long growing seasons and large amounts of precipitation produced the highest risks. The risk assessment followed the general protocols recommended by USEPA, but with different models, weather data, and scenarios. In spite of the differences, the results confirmed that most but not all of the pesticides which had survived the USEPA registration process were also demonstrated safe, with respect to acute risks, by this independent assessment. The five exceptions were explained by differences in models, simulation scenarios, and input data. These results do not mean that the studied pesticides are free of any ecological dangers. In particular, no attempt was made to evaluate chronic risk.

  PublisherDOI

• Development and Testing of a Comprehensive Model of Pesticide Losses from Turf

  ACS symposium series · 2009-12-20 · 1 citations

  book-chapter

  Development of the TURFP simulation model addresses the need for an engineering tool that can simultaneously evaluate pesticide losses via runoff, leaching and volatilization from turf, as a basis for risk assessment and water quality management. TURFP integrates previously tested and published pesticide runoff and volatilization models with a new pesticide leaching component. The leaching model uses a simple approach based on mass balances, and requires soil and pesticide data that are readily available in published databases. Default values are suggested so that the model may be run in situations where measured data is not available for calibration. The uncalibrated leaching model was tested using default parameter values for 427 drainage and 469 pesticide leachate measurements taken at two sites, involving six pesticides and four soils. Mean predicted pesticide loss via leaching was 0.28% of the applied pesticide amounts, compared to an observed mean of 0.25%. The leaching component captured the dynamics of drainage and pesticide leaching occurrences reasonably well, with R2 values of 0.69 for drainage and 0.47 for pesticide leaching. Strengths of the leaching component are that it requires few input parameters and appears to predict pesticide leaching adequately without site-specific calibration.

  PublisherDOI

• The Cayuga Lake Watershed Generalized Watershed Loading Function Geospatial Database [documentation]

  eCommons (Cornell University) · 2009-05-28

  articleSenior author

  This paper documents the database structure and methods used to create the Cayuga Lake Watershed Generalized Watershed Loading Function (GWLF) Geospatial Database.

  Publisher

• Pesticide Decay in Turf: A Review of Processes and Experimental Data

  Journal of Environmental Quality · 2009-01-01 · 37 citations

  reviewSenior author

  Decay rates are central parameters in modeling pesticide fate and transport in the environment. Pesticide decay is usually modeled as a first-order process, and variations in half-life can have significant impacts on model predictions. Decay rates for the foliage and thatch components of turf are scarce, and most simulation efforts must resort to values based on pesticide behavior in soil. This paper describes the main dissipation processes affecting pesticides applied to turf and compares aerobic soil decay rates from the USDA-Agricultural Research Service Pesticide Properties Database (ARS PPD; USDA-ARS, 2006) and from The Pesticide Manual (Tomlin, 2003) to dissipation values in turf found in the literature for 18 pesticides currently registered for turf. Median half-lives were 39.5 d for the ARS values, 35.8 d for Tomlin's values, and 5.7 d for the turf-specific values. The turf dissipation half-lives are considered to be representative of the microbial decay processes occurring in the foliage and thatch layers of well established turf, where the majority of the pesticide is intercepted and retained.

  PublisherDOI

• Regional Analyses of Pesticide Runoff from Turf

  ACS symposium series · 2009-12-20

  book-chapter1st authorCorresponding

  Pesticide runoff loads from turf can vary dramatically with chemical properties and application regime, geographic location, irrigation rates and turf surface. Given the limited availability of field data, it is difficult to realistically consider the range of these variations in exposure assessments. The TurfPQ pesticide runoff model was combined with several other models and data bases to provide a general framework for efficient estimation of turf pesticide runoff loads on both a yearly and daily basis. The process was used to investigate differences in MCPP, fenarimol, iprodione and carbaryl runoff from fairways at four U.S. locations with widely differing climatic regions. Factors which accounted for the observed differences included pesticide properties and application amounts, irrigation applications and growing season runoff. The simulations indicated that runoff loads of a particular pesticide could vary by as much as an order of magnitude among the locations.

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Lawrence J. Tubbs

  6 shared

• Matthew W. Duffany

  New York State Department of Environmental Conservation

  6 shared

• Leslie Shoemaker

  Technological University Dublin

  4 shared

• Antoni Magri

  4 shared

• Ching‐Pin Tung

  National Taiwan University

  3 shared

• Rebecca R. Walden

  Cornell University

  3 shared

• Gerald R. Roy

  University of Massachusetts Amherst

  3 shared

• Greg Farmer

  3 shared