Flooding, Flood Structures and How These Structures Work

Today's topic is flooding, and how humans manage to control and manipulate water. This control mechanism is for preventing damage and making use of the excess water to be used in droughts. Environmental impacts of all types of structural and non-structural measures are to be assessed jointly in the long term in order to maintain sustainable development of land and water resources.

For rivers, the river streams join or separate because of the geological processes. A Watershed is the area of land that collects precipitation, there are areas where mostly drainage occurs too. These have a controllable ratio, but there are instances where this ratio may not be sustained. 

Source: https://bewaterfriendly.com/our-water/watersheds/

The wetland and overland areas that are seen in the figure may change with geological or hydrological alterations. This affects the settlements near the flow. Reasons may include; slopes on the side of the flow may not be steep. When the cannel over banks, this instance may lead to disasters. Solutions for this problem includes; Building Levees or earthen embankments on the sides of the river. 

Source: A Case Study of a Fluvial Deltaic Reservoir. (2018). ResearchGate.

Another solution is diversion canals; diverting water for purposes like irrigation, hydropower generation, and safety. To create a completely different path for the canal is not environmentally and economically achievable. So the canal is merged back into the original flow after taking a different path. So when the water levels rise, this canal transports the excess water to needed areas instead of it damaging the surrounding. 

Souce: Water Transport Structures(2021) FAO

Another solution; Dams. These infrastructures provide storage for excess water.  Each dam has a specific purpose, some may be full for most of the time to provide hydropower, irrigation... But Some dams are usually empty, when a big flood happens the storage fills up. If the reservoir is full then floodgates must be opened in order to let water through. 

The correct way for flood risk management is to determine the climate, geology, and other factors and designing the appropriate flood structure. These structures have negative effects as well so the design must be well thought. Since climate change is creating extreme situations(for example unnatural precipitation and drought.) and we need water resource management more than anything. 

Here are some related video's:

Sources:

• (Water Resources Engineering, Yanmaz A. Melih, 2018)
• (PDF) A Method to Integrate Geological Knowledge in Variogram Modeling of Facies: A Case Study of a Fluvial Deltaic Reservoir. (2018). ResearchGate. https://doi.org/10.4236\/ijg.2018.96021

• 8. Water Transport Structures(2021)   http://www.fao.org/fishery/static/FAO_Training/FAO_Training/General/x6708e/x6708e08.htm

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Best Civil Engineers on Earth: Beavers!

 Beavers are semiaquatic mammals, they build dams and lodges using tree lodges. Dams impound water and lodges serve as shelters. Their infrastructure creates wetlands used by many other species, and because of their effect on other organisms in the ecosystem, they are considered keystone species. They build dams across streams, in order to create a safe environment from predators. This is called a beaver lodge. These dammed streams provided food for water beetles and nymphs, and the ponds created have various types of fish. To conclude, these dams provide tremendous environmental benefits such as groundwater recharge, water quality, and other species benefit from these habitats as well.

An example for a beaver dam

A beaver dam is a dam made out of logs and mud. A dam is something that blocks or slows down the flow of water in a river or a stream. A good portion of these dams is very stable, they might be renovated by other beavers in order to be used since young male beavers have to create a new pond or find an empty one to re-use. 'Some beaver dams in California date back more than 1,000 years.'  

Some controversies about beavers; so these dams are apparently causing flooding and this wipes out land that farmers need. I think this is preventable damage since there maps for where beavers live and where they might build dams, I am no expert but I feel like it can easily be prevented if people were more mindful of these creatures' territory.  And I personally find it very odd to blame an animal's instinct for "damaging nature" when beavers ALMOST went instinct before some regulations came out about hunting beavers, In less than 200 years, the North American beaver went from 90 million to between 10-15 million. In Europe and Asia, just 1,200 beavers remained by 1900.

Anyways, thanks for reading, here are some cute beaver pictures:

Here are some nice videos related to the topic:

Sources:
https://www.treehugger.com/beaver-dams-can-last-centuries-map-shows-4867776
https://www.biophiliafoundation.org/beaver-dam-benefits/
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/16/google-autocomplete-why-beavers-build-dams
https://www.nps.gov/articles/buildabeaverdam.htm#:~:text=What%20is%20a%20beaver%20dam,a%20river%20or%20a%20stream.