Obtaining natural-like flow releases in diverted river reaches from simple riparian benefit economic models

Perona, Paolo; Dürrenmatt, David J.; Characklis, Gregory W.

doi:10.1016/j.jenvman.2013.01.010

Cited by 19 publications

(26 citation statements)

References 41 publications

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“…A key element for assuring the health of regulated river and riparian ecosystems, both in restoration and mitigation projects, is the dynamics of water releases [ Poff et al ., ; Bartholow , ; Moyle and Mount , ]. For appropriate dam regulation and integrated water management, this work helps designing engineered dynamic flow releases based on considerations of the riparian ecosystem as actual water user [ Wood et al ., ; Perona et al ., ].…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Regulation of these flows has homogenized hydrologic conditions [ Poff et al ., ], with consequent spatial reallocation of riparian vegetation [ Perona et al ., ]. The development of ecosustainable management measures [ Poff et al ., ; Arthington et al ., ] requires a better understanding of ecomorphological processes [ Petts , ; Perona et al ., ], many of which are often expressed as transient vegetation dynamics in response to changing scenarios [e.g., Molnar et al ., ; Schnauder and Moggridge , ; Malard et al ., ; Larned et al ., ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This work provides an experimental verification to the afore‐mentioned hypotheses, which is essential to give ecological relevance to hydrologic alteration [ Richter et al ., ; Suen and Eheart , ; Richter and Thomas , ; Costigan and Daniels , ] and will allow the determination of innovative dynamic flow releases that reduce hydropower impact [e.g., Perona et al ., ; Gorla and Perona , ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Transient response of Salix cuttings to changing water level regimes

Gorla

Signarbieux

Turberg

et al. 2015

Water Resources Research

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Sustainable water management requires an understanding of the effects of flow regulation on riparian ecomorphological processes. We investigated the transient response of Salix viminalis by examining the effect of water-level regimes on its above-ground and below-ground biomass. Four sets of Salix cuttings, three juveniles (in the first growing season) and one mature (1 year old), were planted and initially grown under the same water-level regime for 1 month. We imposed three different water-level regime treatments representing natural variability, a seasonal trend with no peaks, and minimal flow (characteristic of hydropower) consisting of a constant water level and natural flood peaks. We measured sap flux, stem water potential, photosynthesis, growth parameters, and final root architecture. The mature cuttings were not affected by water table dynamics, but the juveniles displayed causal relationships between the changing water regime, plant growth, and root distribution during a 2 month transient period. For example, a 50% drop in mean sap flux corresponded with a 21.5 Mpa decrease in leaf water potential during the first day after the water regime was changed. In agreement with published field observations, the cuttings concentrated their roots close to the mean water table of the corresponding treatment, allowing survival under altered conditions and resilience to successive stress events. Juvenile development was strongly impacted by the minimum flow regime, leading to more than 60% reduction of both above-ground and belowground biomass, with respect to the other treatments. Hence, we suggest avoiding minimum flow regimes where Salix restoration is prioritized.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Transient response of Salix cuttings to changing water level regimes

Gorla

Signarbieux

Turberg

et al. 2015

Water Resources Research

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“…This challenging aspect concerns with the ability to find new dynamic environmental flows that can improve ecological efficiency with respect to constant minimal flow policies (e.g., Arthington et al, 2006, Bartholow, 2010, Bizzi et al, 2012 while maintaining economic benefit. Perona et al (2013) have introduced the idea of engineering Dynamic Environmental Flows (henceforth referred to as DEFs) releases by considering the riparian environment as a nontraditional water use. Increasing hydropower production without straining the environment has then shown to be feasible at least for water systems without storage such as small hydropower (e.g., Perona et al, 2013, Lazzaro et al, 2013, Gorla and Perona, 2013, Ta et al, 2016, Razurel et al, 2016.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Perona et al (2013) have introduced the idea of engineering Dynamic Environmental Flows (henceforth referred to as DEFs) releases by considering the riparian environment as a nontraditional water use. Increasing hydropower production without straining the environment has then shown to be feasible at least for water systems without storage such as small hydropower (e.g., Perona et al, 2013, Lazzaro et al, 2013, Gorla and Perona, 2013, Ta et al, 2016, Razurel et al, 2016. Gorla (2014) and Razurel et al (2016) have generalized the method by introducing the concept of non-proportional redistribution.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dynamic water allocation policies improve the global efficiency of storage systems

Niayifar

Perona

2017

Advances in Water Resources

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Water impoundment by dams strongly affects the river natural flow regime, its attributes and the related ecosystem biodiversity. Fostering the sustainability of water uses e.g., hydropower systems thus implies searching for innovative operational policies able to generate Dynamic Environmental Flows (DEF) that mimic natural flow variability. The objective of this study is to propose a Direct Policy Search (DPS) framework based on defining dynamic flow release rules to improve the global efficiency of storage systems. The water allocation policies proposed for dammed systems are an extension of previously developed flow redistribution rules for small hydropower plants by Razurel et al. (Water resources management, 30, 207-223 (2016)).The mathematical form of the Fermi-Dirac statistical distribution applied to lake equations for the stored water in the dam is used to formulate non-proportional redistribution rules that partition the flow for energy production and environmental use. While energy production is computed from technical data, riverine ecological benefits associated with DEF are computed by integrating the Weighted Usable Area (WUA) for fishes with Richter's hydrological indicators.Then, multiobjective evolutionary algorithms (MOEAs) are applied to build ecological versus economic efficiency plot and locate its (Pareto) frontier. This study benchmarks two MOEAs (NSGA II and Borg MOEA) and compares their efficiency in terms of the quality of Pareto's frontier and computational cost. A detailed analysis of dam characteristics is performed to examine their impact on the global system efficiency and choice of the best redistribution rule. Finally, it is found that non-proportional flow releases can statistically improve the global © 2016. This manuscript version is made available under the Elsevier user license http://www.elsevier.com/open-access/userlicense/1.0/ 3 efficiency, specifically the ecological one, of the hydropower system when compared to constant minimal flows.

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Run‐of‐river power plants in Alpine regions: Whither optimal capacity?

Lazzaro

Botter

2015

Water Resources Research

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Although run-of-river hydropower represents a key source of renewable energy, it cannot prevent stresses on river ecosystems and human well-being. This is especially true in Alpine regions, where the outflow of a plant is placed several kilometers downstream of the intake, inducing the depletion of river reaches of considerable length. Here multiobjective optimization is used in the design of the capacity of run-of-river plants to identify optimal trade-offs between two contrasting objectives: the maximization of the profitability and the minimization of the hydrologic disturbance between the intake and the outflow. The latter is evaluated considering different flow metrics: mean discharge, temporal autocorrelation, and streamflow variability. Efficient and Pareto-optimal plant sizes are devised for two representative case studies belonging to the Piave river (Italy). Our results show that the optimal design capacity is strongly affected by the flow regime at the plant intake. In persistent regimes with a reduced flow variability, the optimal trade-off between economic exploitation and hydrologic disturbance is obtained for a narrow range of capacities sensibly smaller than the economic optimum. In erratic regimes featured by an enhanced flow variability, instead, the Pareto front is discontinuous and multiple trade-offs can be identified, which imply either smaller or larger plants compared to the economic optimum. In particular, large capacities reduce the impact of the plant on the streamflow variability at seasonal and interannual time scale. Multiobjective analysis could provide a clue for the development of policy actions based on the evaluation of the environmental footprint of run-of-river plants.

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Obtaining natural-like flow releases in diverted river reaches from simple riparian benefit economic models

Cited by 19 publications

References 41 publications

Transient response of Salix cuttings to changing water level regimes

Transient response of Salix cuttings to changing water level regimes

Dynamic water allocation policies improve the global efficiency of storage systems

Run‐of‐river power plants in Alpine regions: Whither optimal capacity?

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