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Hydraulics and Environment Department Hydraulics and Environment Department

Rita Salgado Brito

Rita Salgado Brito
Phone: 218 443 842

Professional Situation

Senior Researcher at LNEC

Academic and Scientific Degrees

  • 2012 - PhD in Civil Engineering, IST / UTL (Lisbon, Portugal), Dissertation entitled "Monitoring of hydraulic and water quality variables in wastewater drainage systems."
  • 2003 - Master in Hydraulics and Water Resources, IST / UTL, Dissertation entitled "Integrated assessment of wastewater systems."
  • 1997 - Degree in Civil Engineering (Hydraulics and Water Resources), IST / UTL.

Functions and Relevant Public Offices

  • In 2014, joined the Urban Water Division of LNEC as post-doctoral researcher, since 2019 as Assistant Researcher, and since 2024 as Senior Researcher
  • Between 2006 and 2017, teacher at the Technical Institute of Setúbal (ESTBarreiro / IPS).
  • Between 2006 and 2011, developed several consulting projects in urban drainage.
  • Between 1997 and 2006, joined Sanest, S.A., as Tecnical Specialist.

Areas of Research / Interest

  • Urban drainage systems; wastewater and stormwater.
  • Monitoring of hydraulic and water quality parameters.
  • Modeling the hydraulic behavior of surface runoff and urban drainage systems.
  • Condition assessment of drainage systems.
  • Integration of water in urban planning: Nature-Based Solutions.
  • Condition assessment and hydraulic modeling of drainage systems.
  • Nature based solutions.
  • Asset management.
  • Urban Resilience.

Research and Professional Activity

Recent projects:
  • ICARIA - Bridging disaster risk reduction and climate change adaptation in multi-risk management, 2023-2025
  • UP2030 - Planning and Design for Urban Prosperity by 2030, 2023-2025
  • Life Fitting – Demonstration of an innovative PLAN-DO toolbox for a safer, resource efficient and fit-for-purpose wastewater treatment 2023-2025
  • EMUE - Examples of measurement uncertainty evaluation. 2018-2021.
  • RESCCUE - RESilience to cope with Climate Change in Urban arEas - a multisectorial approach focusing on water (H2020). 2016 - 2020.
  • iAFLUI - Iniciativa Nacional para o Controlo de Afluências Indevidas. 1ª (2016-2018) e 2ª edições (2019 – 2021).

Scientific Orientation

Supervision of Thesis
  • Paula Beceiro (2021). Assessing the contribution of Nature-Based Solutions to urban resilience. A comprehensive assessment framework with focus on stormwater management and control. PhD Thesis IST/UTL.
  • João Paulo Almeida (2016). Identificação de fontes de poluição em coletores com recurso a espectros UV-Vis. Master Thesis IST/UTL.

Relevant Publications

Books or book chapters
  • Rodrigues, S., Costa, A., Cardoso, J., Rodrigues, R., Cardoso, M.A., Rosa, M.J., Brito, R.S., Silva, C., Beceiro, P., Jorge, C., Alegre, H., Martinho, G., Pina, J., Silveira, A., Alves, A., Ana, J., Ramos, M., Carrega, M. (2021). Guia de avaliação da qualidade dos serviços de águas e resíduos prestados aos utilizadores - 4.ª geração do sistema de avaliação. Guia Técnico 27, ERSAR. Lisboa, Portugal. ISBN 978-989-8360-42-7. 354 p
  • Cardoso, M.A., Almeida, M.C., Telhado, M.J., Morais, M., Brito, R.S. (2022). Chapter 7 Assessing urban resilience to cope with climate change. Em: Investing in Disaster Risk Reduction for Resilience. Design, methods and knowledge in the face of climate change. Eds. A. Nuno Martins, Gonzalo Lizarralde, Temitope Egbelakin, Liliane Hobeica, J.M. Mendes, Adib Hobeica, Paperback ISBN: 9780128186398. eBook ISBN: 9780128187357.
  • Ribeiro, A.S., Cox, M.G., Almeida, M.A., Sousa, J.A., Martins, L.L., Simões, C., Brito, R.S., Loureiro, D., Silva., M.A., Soares, A.C. (2021). Evaluation of measurement uncertainty in average areal rainfall - uncertainty and propagation for three methods. Example E3.1 in Compendium of examples of EMUE project. Van der Veen, A.M.H. & Cox M. (Eds). Alemanha: EURAMET.
  • Almeida, M.C., Brito, R. S., Cardoso, M.A. (2018). Approach to assess and control inflows into sewers. Technical Course N. 8, ERSAR. ISBN 978-972-98996-8-3).
  • Brito, R., Cardoso, M. C.; Alegre, H. (2018). ISO 55000 as a tool to support planning and decision on sanitation solutions. Technical Course N. 8, ERSAR. ISBN 978-972-98996-8-3).
  • Lopes, R., Tonon, I., Ferreira, F., Matos, J.S., Barreiro, J., Matos, R., Brito, R. S., Fontanals, I., Vendrell, E., Telhado, M.J. (2017). Urban drainage and resilience approaches towards more sustainable cities. Technical Course N. 8, ERSAR. ISBN 978-972-98996-8-3).
  • Alegre, H., Cardoso, M.A., Brito, R.S., Amaral, R. (2017). Guias orientadores: Introdução à Gestão Patrimonial de Infraestruturas. Sistema de avaliação de desempenho no âmbito da gestão patrimonial de infraestruturas. Cadastro de infraestruturas de abastecimento de água, de águas residuais e de águas pluviais. Ordens de serviço. ERSARA. Horta, Portugal.
Scientific journals
  • Brito, R. S., Martinho, M.C., Almeida, M.C., Fernandes, M., Ferreira, S. (2022). Aligning financial and technical procedures for the determination of urban drainage assets’ current and replacement values. Water Policy, IWA Publishing, 24(7), 1109-1123. https://doi.org/10.2166/wp.2022.276.
  • Beceiro, P., Brito, R.S., Galvão, A. (2022). Assessment of the contribution of Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) to urban resilience: application to the case study of Porto. Ecological Engineering 175(6):106489. DOI: 10.1016/j.ecoleng.2021.106489
  • Brito, R.S., Almeida, M.C., Ribeiro, A.S. (2022). Enhancing hydraulic data reliability in sewers. Water Practice and Technology, IWA Publishing (2022) 17 (1): 431–444.  https://doi.org/10.2166/wpt.2021.093
  • Brito, R.S., Almeida, M.C., Silva, N., Barreto, S., Veríssimo, F. (2022). Assessing intermittent saline inflows in urban water systems. Water Science and Technology (2022) 85 (1): 90–103. https://doi.org/10.2166/wst.2021.622 IP3
  • Batac, T., Brown, K., Brito, R.S., Takesue, N., Cranston, I. (2021). An enabling environment for asset management through public policy. Water 2021, 13(24), 3524.
  • Brito, R. S., Alegre, H., Machado, P. (2020). Strategic Asset Management approach for planning investment in a large-scale irrigation system. Water Supply (2020) 20 (6): 2165–2174.
  • Cardoso, M.A, Brito, R. S., Pereira, C., Gonzalez, A., Stevens, J., Telhado, M.J. (2020). RAF - a tool to support cities' action planning. Sustainability 2020, 12 (6), 2349. 64 pp.
  • Cardoso, M.A., Almeida, M.C., Brito, R.S., Gomes, J., Beceiro, P., Oliveira, A. (2020). 1D/2D stormwater modelling to support urban flood risk management in estuarine areas: hazard assessment in the Dafundo case study.  Journal Flood Risk Management 2020 13(4).  pp. 15
  • Brito, R.S., Almeida, M.C., Matos, J.S. (2017). Estimating flow data in wastewater drainage systems using PLS. Urban Water Journal, 14(5), 467-474.
  • Brito, R.S., Lourenço, N., Matos, J., Pinheiro, H. (2016). Calibration transfer between spectrometers for wastewater quality monitoring in drainage systems. Applied Spectroscopy, 70(3), 443-454.

Other scientific and technical Activities

  • Since 2023 – President of LIS-Water - Lisbon International Centre for Water
  • 2019-2023 - Chair of the Strategic Asset Management Specialist Group of the International Water Association (IWA SAM-SG). Vice-chair of the group since 2023.
  • 2018 - Specialist in Sanitary Engineering at the College of Civil Engineering of the Ordem dos Engenheiros.
  • Since 2017 - Member of CT204 (Gestão de Ativos).
  • Since 2016 - Member of ISO TC251 (Asset management).

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