Stormwater BMP implementation and maintenance demand substantial municipal budgets to comply with NPDES permits. Pollutant treatment and runoff reduction are primary goals of BMPs; however, few BMPs can treat all concerns equally, and maintenance condition influences BMP functionality. Interpreting the success or failure of a BMP using common metrics such as %- removals requires subjective judgement of the engineer, manager, or regulatory reviewer.
Since Dr. Fassman-Beck’s last seminar in Minnesota, she has led the development of new BMP performance indices for water quality treatment and hydrology (runoff capture volume) to convert quantitative field monitoring data to simple, unbiased categorical performance determinants with clear management implications, including corrective actions. The index benchmarks performance against specific water quality and runoff capture volumes design goals, while considering operating conditions on a storm-by-storm basis. The index value enables objective assessments across a range of pollutant types, water quality goals, design specifications and/or implementation across a wide variety of landscape settings. The unbiased and transferable metrics enable post-construction performance evaluation of a unique BMP, or amongst BMPs of the same or different types, while deconstructing metrics provide information to support maintenance and planning, for example by tracking performance over time. An open-source web application and calculator have been developed to implement and explore the BMP Performance Index.
Applying the BMP Performance Index to field monitoring data from the Southern California Stormwater Monitoring Coalition’s Regional BMP Monitoring Network, this seminar will show how the Performance Index is informing regional management decisions in relation to TMDL compliance.
Dr. Fassman-Beck is the Engineering Department Head at SCCWRP, responsible for developing and implementing a research program on BMP effectiveness. Research areas range from site-scale BMP evaluations, to integrating BMP effectiveness into watershed models, to advancing stormwater capture and use, and advancing sensing technology and applications in urban water quality. Dr.
Fassman-Beck is has extensive experience in field monitoring and laboratory studies evaluating the performance of urban stormwater runoff quantity (hydrologic) and quality (contaminant) best management practices (BMPs), with emphasis on bioretention systems, infiltration technologies (dry wells, galleries), permeable pavement, and swales, as well as non-structural controls such as street sweeping and turf replacement BMPs. She is the co-lead for the US EPA Southwest Stormwater Center of Excellence and manages a Regional BMP Monitoring Network in southern California. She has co-authored over 45 peer reviewed journal articles, and contributed to BMP design manuals in New Jersey, North Carolina, and Auckland (New Zealand).
Dr. Fassman-Beck currently serves as a Technical Reviewer for the National Municipal Stormwater Alliance Stormwater Testing and Evaluation for Products and Practices, and on the Advisory Board for the State of Oregon Stormwater Technology Testing Center. She has recently served on a National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine Consensus Committee on Managing Pollutant Loads in Highway Stormwater Runoff (2025-2027) and the US EPA Board of Scientific Counselors, Safe and Sustainable Water Resources Committee (2017-2021). For over 10 years she has been an associate editor of Journal of Sustainable Water in the Built Environment. Prior to joining SCCWRP in 2019, she had a 15-yr academic career between the University of Auckland and Stevens Institute of Technology. She was the recipient of the American Society of Civil Engineers NJ Educator of the Year (2018), Wesley W. Horner Award (2014) and Outstanding Reviewer (2012).