Importance of Field Data for Numerical Modeling to Dam Removal on a Mountain Channel

Abstract:

In 2011, a 13-m high Chijiawan Dam on Chijiawan Creek was removed due to the safety concern due to aging structure and scoured dam foundation as well as habitat restoration of the endangered Formosan landlocked salmon. Similar to Chijiawan Dam, many dams in Taiwan are located in steep mountainous area with coarser sediment and high sediment yield, and may be removed in the near future. Since the capability of current sediment transport model is insufficient, a systematic planning of field survey and monitoring work can effectively help to decrease data uncertainty in simulation. In this study, we aimed to understand the minimum requirements of data for numerical model to predict channel responses after dam removal, according to the data of pre-project and long term post-project monitoring works from removal of Chijiawan dam.

We collected the hourly discharge data of Taipower gaging station located 6.8 km from the dam from 2010 to 2012 and conducted surveys of grain size distributions, cross-sectional and longitudinal profiles. We applied Sedimentation and River Hydraulics (SRH) one-dimensional model to simulate bed elevation changes by different setting of data input, including bed sediment, roughness coefficient, cross-section spacing, and flow discharge. Then, we performed a sensitivity analysis by using Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) to evaluate the minimum requirements of data for predicting to dam removal. The RMSE variability of varied setting of bed sediment, roughness coefficient, cross-section spacing, and flow discharge ranged from 0.02 m, 0.17 m, 0.14 m and 0.09 m, respectively. The results highlight that the simulation is sensitive to roughness coefficient, cross-section spacing, and flow discharge, and less sensitive to bed sediment. We anticipate the results will help decision maker to understand the importance of field data in future removals.