Publications related to Environmental impact of reservoirs

Exploring the efficacy of reservoir fine sediment management measures through numerical simulations

Giovanni De Cesare, Azin Amini, Samuel Luke Vorlet, Montana Marshall

Reservoir sedimentation is one of the main challenges in the sustainable operation of large reservoirs because it causes volume loss, affecting hydropower production capacity, dam safety, and flood management. To ensure the sustainability of deep reservoir ...

CRC Press/Balkema2023

Hydromorphological assessment of sediment augmentation measures in gravel-bed rivers

Christian Mörtl

In the riverine environment, the riverscape, sediment and flow regime are essential drivers for natural habitat dynamics. Today, most water courses in Europe are regulated, and their natural dynamics are impaired. Flood releases coupled with the artificial ...

EPFL2023

Experimental modeling of fine sediment routing: SEDMIX device with thrusters

Giovanni De Cesare, Azin Amini, Montana Marshall

Reservoir sedimentation is a key challenge for storage sustainability because it causes volume loss, affecting hydropower production capacity, dam safety, and flood management. A preliminary EPFL study proposed and studied an innovative device (called SEDM ...

CRC Press/Balkema2023

Characterization of Thruster-Induced Turbulence for Fine Sediment Suspension

Giovanni De Cesare, Azin Amini, Montana Marshall, Andre Luis Stakowian

Reservoir sedimentation is a key challenge for storage sustainability because it causes volume loss, affecting hydropower production capacity, dam safety, and flood management. A preliminary EPFL study proposed and studied an innovative device (called SEDM ...

2023

The clogging of riverbeds: A review of the physical processes

Giovanni De Cesare, Romain Maxime Dubuis

Fine sediment represents an important part of the solid flux of rivers. Due to the size of these particles, they are often transported as suspended load. They gradually fill the pores of the substrate forming the hyporheic zone or cover the substrate by se ...

2023

Numerical Simulations of an Innovative Water Stirring Device for Fine Sediment Release: The Case Study of the Future Trift Reservoir

Pedro Filipe De Almeida Manso, Azin Amini, Anass Chraibi

Reservoir sedimentation and consequently lack of storage volume and perturbation of the operation of intakes and bottom outlet is a key challenge affecting both hydropower production as well as dam safety and flood management. In the framework of a peer-re ...

Springer2020

Erosion, transport and deposition of a sediment replenishment under flood conditions

Anton Schleiss, Mário Jorge Rodrigues Pereira Da Franca, Severin Stähly, Christopher Robinson

River reaches downstream of dams with constant residual discharge often lack sediment supply and periodic high flows due to dam sediment retention and flow regulation, respectively. To test a novel multi-deposit methodology for defining environmental flows ...

2020

Innovative methods to release fine sediments from reservoirs developed at EPFL, Switzerland

Anton Schleiss, Giovanni De Cesare, Pedro Filipe De Almeida Manso, Azin Amini, Sabine Chamoun

Electricity generation, water supply, flood protection, flow regulation and navigation are amongst the main services provided by reservoirs. Sedimentation affects the sustainability of reservoirs, by reducing their storage capacity, and increases the negat ...

2019

Sediment replenishment as a measure to enhance river habitats in a residual flow reach downstream of a dam

Anton Schleiss, Mário Jorge Rodrigues Pereira Da Franca, Severin Stähly

Floodplains downstream of a dam, where the natural flow regime is replaced by a constant residual flow discharge, often lack sediment supply and periodic inundation due to the absence of natural flood events. In this study, a flood with a one-year return p ...

Canadian Dam Association2019

Sediment replenishment combined with an artificial flood improves river habitats downstream of a dam

Anton Schleiss, Mário Jorge Rodrigues Pereira Da Franca, Severin Stähly, Christopher Robinson

River reaches downstream dams where a constant residual flow discharge is imposed, often lack sediment supply and periodic inundation due to the absence of natural flood events. In this study, a two-year return flood was released from an upstream reservoir ...

Nature Research2019

Hydraulic-morphological habitat assessment in rivers considering residual flow, sediment replenishment and artificial flood events

Severin Stähly

Dams store water and trap sediment in their reservoirs. Downstream river segments, hence, are affected by a limited sediment dynamics. This becomes obvious by river bed incision, limited geomorphological variability and depletion of hydraulic habitats for ...

EPFL2019

Bottom slope influence on flow and bedload transfer through contractions

Anton Schleiss, Mário Jorge Rodrigues Pereira Da Franca, Sebastian Schwindt

In-stream open check dams are essential for flood protection at mountain rivers that are characterized by steep slopes (>1%) and sediment-laden flood discharges. These structures comprise an opening acting as a lateral or vertical flow contraction to force ...

Taylor & Francis Ltd2019

Upstream Erosion and Sediment Passage at Piano Key Weirs

Anton Schleiss, Michael Pfister, Ivan Stojnic

Piano key weirs (PKWs) are a weir type characterized by an effective rating curve. Accordingly, this control structure is primarily applied at dams to increase the spillway capacity. In recent years, PKWs also have been implemented in rivers combined with ...

2019

Fine sediment routing in a cascade of alpine reservoirs: Influence of the inlet angle on settling of fine sediments

Anton Schleiss, Pedro Filipe De Almeida Manso, Sebastián Guillén Ludeña

Reservoir sedimentation is, at present, one of the main concerns in the operational management of dams. The resulting reduction of storage capacity has negative impacts on the hydropower production, flood protection, and availability of water for irrigatio ...

2017

Replenishment of sediment downstream of dams : erosion and transport processes

Elena Battisacco

Dams on rivers alter the sediment continuum, trapping water and sediment in the upstream reservoirs. River reaches downstream are affected by several negative effects, such as bed incision, reduction of the river morphological variability, development of a ...

EPFL2016

Reservoir sedimentation

Anton Schleiss, Giovanni De Cesare, Mário Jorge Rodrigues Pereira Da Franca, Carmelo Juez Jiménez

Artificial water storage, originated by the construction of dams, is essential for the sustainable health and welfare of civilizations since it supplies water for human consumption, irrigation and energy production. Furthermore, dam reservoirs are used for ...

Taylor & Francis Ltd2016

Physical modelling optimization of a filter check dam in Switzerland

Anton Schleiss, Giovanni De Cesare, Sebastian Schwindt

After a major flood with a peak discharge of 177 m³/s in the city of Martigny (Valais, Switzerland) by the alpine river Drance in October 2000, the local authorities are strengthening efforts for the protection of the urban area. The Drance has an annual a ...

2016

Modeling sediment pulses on an armored channel

Anton Schleiss, Mário Jorge Rodrigues Pereira Da Franca, Carmelo Juez Jiménez, Elena Battisacco

Dams trap sediments in the upstream reservoir, thus the continuity in sediment transport along the river is interrupted. Several negative aspects related to the lack of sediment supply were observed downstream many dams and the artificial replenishment of ...

2016

Ecomorphodynamic approaches to river anabranching patterns

Paolo Perona, Benoît Crouzy

We investigate the influence of vegetation on river morphological instabilities using an analytical framework. We first discuss the important role of the hydrological (flooding frequency) and biological (vegetation development rate) timescales. As long as ...

Elsevier2016

Laboratory research: bed load guidance into sediment bypass tunnel inlet

Anton Schleiss, Giovanni De Cesare, Pedro Filipe De Almeida Manso, Milad Daneshvari

Sediment management in reservoirs situated in mountainous regions is a critical operational concern with direct implications in live storage sustainability and therefore in production revenues. The paper presents the main results of a physical model study ...

R.M. Boes ed.2015