Calculation of Water and Sediment Flow in Hydropower Reservoirs

N. R. B. Olsen Research Engineer The Norwegian Hydrotechnical Laboratory N 7034 Trondheim, Norway O. F. Jimnez Hydraulic Engineer Instituto Costarricense de Electricidad

Apdo. 10032-1000
San Jos, Costa Rica

A. Livoll Research Engineer Department of Hydraulic and Environmental Engineering The Norwegian Institute of Technology N 7034 Trondheim, Norway

L. Abrahamsen Civil Engineer STATKRAFT ANLEGG A/S P. Box 231 N 1322 H0vik, Norway

Introduction The flow of water in two hydropower reservoirs in Costa Rica is calculated by a numerical model. The model uses a finite volume method to solve the Navier-Stokes equations for three dimensions on a general nonorthogonal grid. The k-e turbulence model is used to solve the Reynolds-stress term. Another threedimensional finite volume model is used to calclate sediment concentration in the reservoirs by solving the diffusion/convection equation for the sediment concentration. For one of the reservoirs, field measurements are carried out to verify the results from the numerical model. There is good agreement between calculated and measured water velocity field, even though no calibration of the model has been performed. The calculated sediment flow and trap efficiency seem reasonable. The measured concentrations are uncertain, but indcate that the calculated vales can be corred. The model is also used to calclate sediment deposition in the other reservoir over a period of 20 years. 1. Bref Background Investigation of reservoir sedimentation can be done at several levis of detail, starting from empirical methods of computing the trap efficiency, to complex computational and physical modelling. The estimations can consider operation of the reservoir with varying discharges and water levis, several different sediment sizes, deposition and erosin processes etc. The main motivation for using numerical models for calculation of sediment movements is that it is difficult to simlate the fmer sediments in a physical model. The scaling laws are different for suspended sediments and bedload [Kobus1], which means that it can be difficult to simlate interaction between the two transpon modes. Cohesive forces between particles may also be a problem when scaling down the fmer particles. With regard to numerical models it is highly desirable to use a two or three-dimensional model because of the complex geometry characteristics of many reservoirs. The rapidly decreasing cost of computer time gives 3D numerical models a potential to be preferred over physical model studies for economical reasons. By using a 3D numerical model instead of a physical model results can be obtained faster and at a lower cost. A condition is that the results from the numerical model have sufficient quality. In the present study this has been investigated for simulation of water and sediment in a hydropower reservoir, using the SSIIM model. The SSIIM model is a public domain program that can be downloaded from the Internet, from the address ftp.cdrom.com, in directory pub/os2/2_x/educate. The SSIIM model has been used to simlate sediment deposition in reservoirs before [Olsen and Melaaen ], but these simulations were not verified by measurements. 2. Theoretical background The numerical model simulates the flow by the Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes equations as

Bibliographical data for the author ame and Affiliation Education ttle Dr. Binar Tesaker, Head of Research Since 1963: SDSTTEF NHL, The Norwegian Hydrotechnical Laboratory, Section of River Engineering. Civil engineer 1958, Norwegian Institute of Technology Dr.Ing. (PhD) 1969, Norwegian Instute of Technology

(i)
In Equation 1 U is the averaged velocity, u is the fluctuating velocity, x is a length scale, P is the pressure, 5 is the Kronecker delta, p is the water density and v is the viscosity. The turbulent stresses in Equation 1 are modelled with the k-e turbulence model. A further description of the k-e model is given by [Rodi3]. The wall law for rough boundary is used [Schlichting4]. Sediment transpon is in general divided in bedload and suspended load. The suspended load can be calculated with the convection-diffusion equation for the sediment concentration, c:

The fall velocity of the sediment particles is denoted w. The diffusion coefficient, r, is taken from the k-e model. Equations 1 and 2 are discretized by a control volume approach [Patankar5]. The bed concentration is obtained by using a total load formula together with formulas for vertical sediment and velocity distribution for uniform flow. This concentration is used in the bed cells and Equation 2 is solved for all the other cells. Because Equation 2 is not solved for the bed cells, sediment continuity is not necessarily fulfilled for the bed cells. The sediment continuity defect gives a vertical velocity for the bed level for each cell. When a time step is determined, this is multiplied with the bed change velocity to give the actual bed movements. The following formula is used:

where Azbed is the change in bed elevation, At is a time step given by the user, r is a conversin coefficient between flux of sediment and the volume it occupies at the bed, AF is the flux of sediment and Az is the horizontal rea of the cell. 3. Calculation of water and sediment concentration in Garita Reservoir La Garita Hydropower Plant is located 40 km west of San Jos, capital of Costa Rica. This is a run of the river plant with a diversin dam located in the Rio Grande river. 17 m3/s is diverted to a re-regulating reservoir by a 6 km long system of tunnels and channels. The Garita re-regulating reservoir had an original live storage of 436 000 m3. Approximately 125 000 m3 of sediments deposits every year, requiring dredging every other year. Fig. 1 shows a map of the reservoir. The map is based on echo sounding surveying of cross-sections with 50 meter intervals. In the summer of 1993 a study of the reservoir was carried out [Abrahamsen6]. Velocity profiles and current directions in the plae were measured in three to six locations for each cross-section. The measurements were made from a boat using a magnetic-based current meter. Sediment profile concentrations were measured using a standard point sampler at several locations on each cross-section of the reservoir. A grid of the Garita reservoir is made on the basis of the map shown in Fig. 1. The grid has 8 cells in the vertical direction and 33x31 cells in the horizontal directions. Fig. 2 shows a depth-averaged water flow vector plot of the reservoir. Calculations are done for roughnesses of ks equal to 1 cm and 1 mm. The differences between the results for the two roughnesses are so small that it is not possible to observe it on the plots. Therefore only one case is shown. Fig. 2 shows that all the recirculation zones of the reservoir are simulated. Looking at the location of the centre of the main recirculation zone, there is a small difference between the simulated and measured flow field. However, considering that no calibration of the model has been performed, the calculated flow fields coincide very well with the measured vales. The deviations between calculated and measured velocities are possibly due to inaccurate modelling of the geometry. The sediment concentration in the channel flowing into the reservoir is measured several times during the period the concentration samples are taken in the reservoir. On the basis of the concentrations in the channel, a sediment load of 1 kg/s is used in the numerical calculation. This is divided in five sizes based on the grain

size analysis of the suspended sediment in the inflow channel. Total depth-averaged concentration in the reservoir is shown on Fig. 3. The concentration is showen along the main flow path from the entrance to the exit. The figure shows both measured and calculated vales. The measured concentrations are scaled to be equivalent to an inflow of 1 kg/s. The measurements lasted for three days. The water flow remained stationary, but sediment flow varied between 0.6 to 2.1 kg/s during the sampling period due to changes in the sediment concentration in the river. This caused some uncertainty with regard to the assumption of steady conditions for the sediment calculations.

Figure 1. Map of Garita Reservoir, depths in meters, 0.5 meters between contour lines.

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Figure 3. Concentrations in a longitudinal section from inlet to outlet. The trap efficiency of the reservoir is calculated. Table 1 shows the calculated and measured trap efficiency for the total concentration for several days of the sampling. This is based on concentration measurements in the inflow canal and in the outlet of the reservoir. Table 1 shows that there are variations in the measurements. The sediment concentrations were measured several times each day. It was observed that the day with the most stable concentration was the 1 of September. This day also had the lowest inflow concentration. The calculated trap efficiency is very cise to the observed valu for this day. Note that the water discharge into the reservoir was constant during the period, so the varying vales of the concentration measurements are due to variations in the concentration in the inflowing water. Calculated 58.8 45.8 22.1 31 Aueust 69.0 33.9 50.9 1 September 38.0 30.2 20.5 2 September 123.6 162.0 -28.6 3 September 61.8 59.1

Inflow (ppm) Outflow (ppm) Trap efficiency (%)

4.4

Table 1. Trap efficiencies at different days. When looking at Fig. 2 there are some discrepancies between calculated and measured velocities. One of the reasons for the discrepancies is that the flow is not completely steady. The location of the recirculating zones changes somewhat periodically. Because the numerical model does not include the time terms, this effect is not modelled. Another cause of errors is the modelling of the geometry. The grid is made from data from cross-sections of the reservoir, which are taken 50 meters apart. There may be geometrical features located between the cross-sections that not have been included in the calculations. Dredging of the reservoir had been going on until some days before the measurements started. This could have caused some irregularities in the bed geometry, which would not be included in the grid. The irregularities could cause local erosin at some locations, which is not simulated by the numerical model. The concentration calculation seems reasonable, because the fner particles have a very small trap efficiency and the coarse particles have a high trap efficiency. Unfortunately the sediment inflow to the reservoir vares significantly. It is also possible that some sediments from one day are still present in the reservoir the following day. It is therefore difficult to scale the concentration measurements based on the measured inflow vales. 4. Calculation of sediment deposition in Angostura Reservoir The Angostura hydropower project is located in the Reventazn river, about 50 km east of San Jos in Costa

Rica. This is a run of the river plant which utilities water from Rio Reventazn and two of its tributaries and a head of 142 meters. An installed capacity of 177 MW is planned. The Angostura dam is presently under construction. The dam will crate the Angostura reservoir, which will have a volume of 16 million m3. A map of the reservoir is shown in Fig. 4. The Reventazn river has an annual average water discharge of about 105 m'/s. Approximately 1.5 million tons of sediments is estimated to flow into the reservoir each year. Some of this will be trapped, and decrease the storage volume.

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Inflow Figure 4. Map of the Angostura reservoir before deposition. The lifetime of the reservoir is a very important parameter for the economy of the project. Several models have been used to estmate this. The one-dimensional model HEC-6 was used [Jimnez et. al.7]. In this study two other models have been used. The first is a two-dimensional width-averaged model for sediment concentration calculation. The second is the fully three-dimensional model SSIIM. The two-dimensional sediment model bases the water flow on a one-dimensional calculation. The convectiondiffusion equation (2) is solved for the case where the cross-stream terms are zero. A two-dimensional grid is made which has 10 cells in the vertical direction and 16 cells in the horizontal direction. Constant diffusion and velocity over the depth are assumed. The two-dimensional model is run with an inflow of 350 mVs over 27 years. On the basis of measured concentrations in Rio Reventazn, a sediment load of 1000 kg/s is used. This is divided in three sizes (sand, silt and clay) based on grain size analysis. A time step of 0.17 years is used. The results are shown in Fig. 5, which illustrates the temporal development of the trap efficiency and the effective volume during 27 years. The trap efficiency reduces from 59,6 % to 27,9 % and the effective volume reduces from 11.3 mili, m3 to 2.7 mili, m3. The fully three-dimensional model is also used. The velocity feld is calculated from an initial grid of 11 cells in the vertical direction and 9x54 cells in the horizontal directions. The resulting velocity feld is shown in Fig. 6 and Fig. 7. This is used for calculation of sediment movement and deposition. A second grid is made on the basis of deposition during one time step. The water and sediment flow is recalculated for this grid, which give new bed levis. This sequence is repeated 10 times, with time steps of 3.4 years initially and 1,7 years later on. The results of the simulations are shown in Fig. 6 to Fig. 20. The flow fields at different times are shown in Fig. 6 to Fig. 13. The changes in geometry because of deposition are illustrated in figure 14 to 19. Because the entrance of the reservoir is shallow, a ridge develops in the middle of the uppstream part of the reservoir. This ridge affects the flow pattern and illustrates the three-dimensional nature of the deposition. Such effects are not possible to simlate with a one-dimensional model.

S imulotion wth RE S DE P. Q=350 m3/s.

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Figure .Velocities at the surface. Initial situation.

Velocity, profile 5, 0.3 m/s arrow:

Figure 7. Longitudinal section in the middle of the rcservoir. Initial situation. Note that the scales are disorted.

0.5 m/s arrow:

Figure 8. Velocities at the surface. Situation after 3.4 years.

0.5 m/s arrow:

Figure 9. Velocities at the surface. Situation after 6.8 years of depositlon.

0.5 m/s arrow:

0.5 m/s arrow:

Figure 10. Surface velocities. Situation after 10.2 years.

Figure 11. Surface velocities. Situation after 13.6 years.

0.5 m/s arrow:

1.0 m/s arrow:

Figure 12. Surface velocities. Situation after 17 years.

Figure 13. Surface veiocities. Situation after 20.4 years.

Figure 14. Map of the reservoir after 3.4 years of deposition.

Figure 15. Map of the reservoir after 6.8 years of deposition.

Figure 16. Map of the reservoir after 10.2 years of deposition.

Figure 17. Map of the reservoir after 13.6 years of deposition.

Figure 18. Map of the reservoir after 17 years of deposition.

Figure 19. Map of the reservoir after 20.4 years of deposition.

SSIIMQ=350m3/s
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Yecr Figure 20. Change in trap efficiency and effective volunte. Three-dimensional model. The effective reservoir volume and trap efficiency as a function of time is shown in Fig. 20. The difference between the result from the two models can be seen when comparing Fig. 5 and Fig. 20. The two-dimensional model gives a volume reduction to 2.7 million m3 after 27 years, while the three-dimensional model gives the same result after only 20 years. The higher deposition can be due to the three-dimensional effects. A possible reason for the increase in trap efficiency are longer flow paths for the sediment particle. As the velocity pattern in Figures 6 to 13 Ilstrales, the flow is influenced by large scale eddies. The flow path and rctention time for a sediment particle will therefore increase. Figures 6 and 8 to 13 show the water velocity flow field at the surface. A similar complex water flow exists in the whole depth of the reservoir. This is illustrated by the flow field in a longitudinal section, shown in Figure 7. The difference between the two-dimensional and the three-dimensional model may also be due to some of the simplifications necessary in the three-dimensional model. The most serious simplification is the use of as large time steps as 3.4 years. This leads to great changes during each time step. As much as 2.4 million m3 of sediments deposits before the geometry and flow field is changed. The changes take place according to a seperate algorithm, "accellerated deposition", which take care of bed elevation increases above a certain level. This level is chosen so that a minimum water depth is maintained. Depositions above this level is moved to neighbouring cells. If this method is not used, the large time step can give depositions above the water level.

which is unphysical. This method is a necessary simplification when using large time steps. If smaller time steps are used, computational time will be too excessive for practical purposes. The minimum water depth in the accelerated deposition routine is chosen by the user. The results from the two-dimensional model is used to get a good estmate for this parameter. 5. Conclusions An importan! aspect of this study is that the calculation of the water flow field has been performed without calibration of the numerical model. The constants in the k-e model are not changed, and changes in the roughness for the wall laws for the bed have very little effect. The measurements at Garita reservoir shows that the three-dimensional model gives a reasonable flow field. It is thereby shown that the numerical model can be applied directly without calibration for estimation of the water flow field for this case. The calculated sediment flow and trap efficiency for the Garita case, seems reasonable. The measured concentrations are uncertain, but indcate that the calculated vales can be correct. The three-dimensional calculation from the Angostura reservoir shows that after 20 years, the reservoir has only 24 % of the capacity left. This can be compared with the two-dimensional calculation, which gives the same capacity after 27 years. The input for the three-dimensional calculations is a steady water discharge of 350 mVs. This is a simplification of the real inflow, which will vary between 50 and 1000 mVs during a year. Flushing of the reservoir will also take place, and this will increase-the effective storage volume of the reservoir. The flushing is not simulated in this study. Approximations in numerical techniques have various effects on the results of simulations of water and sediment flow in the reservoir. It is important that these effects are assessed and taken into account when interpreting the final results. When this is done, the numerical model can give useful information about water and sediment flow in hydropower reservoirs. Acknowledgements We want to thank Professor D. K. Lysne for giving advice for this study. We also want to thank ICE for their co-operation in this work, and especially Eng. L. Urena and Eng. G. Ibarra. The Norwegian Research Council has provided partly funding for this project.

Referentes 1. Kobus, H. "Hydraulic Modelling", Germn Association for Water Resources and LandImprovement, 1978. 2. Olsen, N. R. B. and Melaaen, M. C. "Numerical modelling of erosin around a cylinder and sediment deposition in a hydropower reservoir", 8th International Conference on Numerical Methods in Laminar and Turbulent Flow, Swansea. 1993. 3. Rodi, W. "Turbulence models and their application in hydraulics",//!.///? State-of-the-artpaper. 1980 4. Schlichting, H. "Boundary Layer Theory", 7th ed., McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York. 1979. 5. Patankar, S. V. "Numerical Heat Transfer and Fluid Flow", McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York. 1980 6. Abrahamsen, L. "Sediment deposition in water reservoirs", M.S. Thesis, Divisin of Hydraulic and Environmental Engineering, The Norwegian Institute of Technology. 1993. (In Norwegian) 7. Jimnez, O. R., Alvarado, P. G., Ramrez, M. C. and Valverde, J. B., "Angostura Hydropower Project - Preliminary report on sedimentation in the reservoir", ICE, San Jos, Costa Rica. 1993. (In Spanish)

Biographical details of the authors N. R. B. Olsen graduated in Civil Engineering from the Norwegian Institute of Technology in 1987. He studied sediment transport for one year at Colorado State University in 1989. He obtained a dr. ing. degree in

numerical sediment transpon at the Divisin of Hydraulic Engineering at the Norwegian Institute of Technology in 1991. From 1991 he has worked as Research Engineer at the Norwegian Hydrotechnical Laboratory, specialising in three-dimensional numerical models for water and sediment transpon. O. F. Jimnez graduated in Civil Engineering from the University of Costa Rica in 1981. He obtained a MSc in Hydraulic Engineering from Washington State University, USA, in 1987. From 1981 he has worked for Instilo Costarricense de Electricidad, in the reas of hydraulic transients analysis, river engineering, design of hydraulic structures and planning studies for hydro powerplants. A. Levoll graduated in Civil Engineering from the Norwegian Institute of Technology in 1991. From 1992 he has worked as Research Engineer at the Norwegian Institute of Technology, Department of Hydraulic and Environmental Engineering. He has specialised in river hydraulics, and is currently working on a dr. ing. degree on downstream consequences of dam failures and hazard floods. L. Abrahamsen graduated in civil engineering from the Norwegian Institute of Technology in 1993. He did his thesis on numerical modelling of water and sediment flow in hydropower reservoirs. From 1994 he has worked for STATKRAFT ANLEGG A/S, supervising contract work on refurbishing of hydropower dams. He has also previosly worked for five years as technical supervisor for a contractor.