River Bathymetry Model Based on Floodplain Topography

Abstract

An appropriate digital elevation model (DEM) is required for purposes of hydrodynamic modelling of floods. Such a DEM describes a river's bathymetry (bed topography) as well as its surrounding area. Extensive measurements for creating accurate bathymetry are time-consuming and expensive. Mathematical modelling can provide an alternative way for representing river bathymetry. This study explores new possibilities in mathematical depiction of river bathymetry. A new bathymetric model (Bathy-supp) is proposed, and the model's ability to represent actual bathymetry is assessed. Three statistical methods for the determination of model parameters were evaluated. The best results were achieved by the random forest (RF) method. A two-dimensional (2D) hydrodynamic model was used to evaluate the influence of the Bathy-supp model on the hydrodynamic modelling results. Also presented is a comparison of the proposed model with another state-of-the-art bathymetric model. The study was carried out on a reach of the Otava River in the Czech Republic. The results show that the proposed model's ability to represent river bathymetry exceeds that of his current competitor. Use of the bathymetric model may have a significant impact on improving the hydrodynamic model results.

Toward More Actionable Flood‐Risk Information

“…Flood inundation estimates require reliable surface topographic data and geometric representation of the river channel (Bures et al., 2019; Dey et al., 2019; Z. Liu & Merwade, 2018). Digital elevation models (DEMs) provide detailed topographic data.…”

“…Scientists produce high‐resolution DEMs by applying remote sensing technology such as Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) (Hilldale & Raff, 2008). However, LiDAR cannot penetrate the water surface to yield bathymetric results and, therefore, cannot capture submerged river channel features (Bures et al., 2019). LiDAR and DEM information are often integrated with field‐surveyed bathymetry data to improve the representation of riverbed topography.…”

Semi-Rigid Erosion Control Techniques with Geotextiles Applied to Reservoir Margins in Hydroelectric Power Plants, Brazil

“…Differential bathymetry has been used in different analyses in water bodies, such as in the margins of reservoirs, river slopes, and coastal areas (for example, [36][37][38][39][40]). It is noteworthy that most of the analyses are performed with extensive bathymetric databases.…”

Drone-Based Bathymetry Modeling for Mountainous Shallow Rivers in Taiwan Using Machine Learning

“…Although the abovementioned state-of-the-art techniques show a reasonable and reliable bathymetry modeling ability, they are mainly established for the application of wide areas and huge scales, e.g., wide rivers [9,16,20,21], lakes [5], or oceans [10,18,19,22]. Additionally, due to the limitation of satellite spatial and temporal resolution and the influence of cloud cover, most of the research results are only applicable to large sections and high-water-depth areas [23].…”