Flood and Drought Management

Lecture 3 Flood Management

Flood Management Nature of Flood Damage

The extent of flood damage
Physical Economical Social Environmental

Flood Management Damages due to Flooding

Every year, nearly 196 million individuals from over 90 countries are exposed to a calamitous flood event. In sum, between 1980 and 2000 over 170,000 deaths were attributable to major flooding. Over time, the techniques to minimize detrimental effects and amplify some of the benefits, has grown and become more complex (Andrea and Karthick. 2004)

Flood Management - Definition

Flood management is defined as the set of all measures , physical or otherwise , that enable the communities that inhabit the flood plain to live in harmony with the extreme natural events, minimizing undue hardship to the extent practicable.

Flood Management Building Blocks

Flood management includes :
Preventive, Engineering, Social, Economic, and Administrative measures

Flood Management core philosophy

An adjustment of the river flow to suit mans convenience An adjustment of mans activities to suit the rivers convenience.

Flood Management - percepts

Reducing the scale of floods (i.e. better catchment management, controlling runoff, detention basins, dams, protecting wetlands); Isolating the threat of floods (i.e. flood embankments, flood proofing, limiting floodplain development);
Increasing peoples coping capacity (emergency planning, forecasting, warning, evacuation, compensation, insurance)

Flood Management
A number of conceptualization of flood management measures cited in literature : Arey and Bauman(1971) , Kate(1962), White(18),Yevjevich ( 1974), etc Yevjevich ( 1974)
Flood prevention Flood prediction Flood proofing Physical control Insurance

Flood Prevention
Defined as those designed to prevent or mitigate a flood hazard by controlling its causes. Causal factors :
Primary
The natural process ( rainfall, snow melt, breach of impoundments)

Secondary
Man made developments in the watershed which tamper with the natural process

Flood Prediction
The measures of flood prediction depends as those techniques that allow the competent authority to forecast the intensity and duration of a flood event.
Important questions
How accurate are the forecasts and how far in advance can they be made ? and What is the economic worth of the forecasts ?

Flood Prediction

The flood forecast or flood warning alerts the community to prepare for an eventual flood defense

Prediction can be considered as an input to warning systems

Flood Plain Proofing

Is defined as those measures designed to minimize damage to life and property in the event of inundation , whether by calculated risk or by the failure of some other means to perform as expected. Measures
Land use planning Land elevation Flood proofing of buildings Community awareness of the extent of flooding

Physical Control
Physical control measures are defined as those measures by which man engineers the characteristics of the watershed and watercourse in order to prevent the flood event from causing damage to life and property. Can be
intensive or
Those of structural type by which the flood waters are confined to the main channel or otherwise channeled so that they do not run uncontrolled

Extensive
Relate to the practices in the overall basin, such as soil conservation measures and control of vegetative cover

Flood Insurance
Is a means of spreading the individual losses due to flood among the wider sector of the society.
The public disaster approach Public flood insurance Mixed public private flood insurance

Flood Management - Methods

Structural measures
which are engineering measures to minimize the risk of a water course overtopping its bank

Non- structural measures

are varied in nature and are aimed at minimizing the social and economic loss to individuals in the event that the watercourse does overtop its bank and runs uncontrolled over the flood plain..

Structural Measures
Physical measures Types
Intensive ( in the river channel) Extensive ( in the watershed)

Intensive measures are of three types :

those that accelerate the flow those that retard the flow, and those that divert the flow Include : floodways and diversion channels

Structural Measures
Extensive measures
Are those that aim at modifying the rainfall runoff relation for the watershed.
Changing the rate of overland flow Controlling sediment yield

Snow melt management

Extensive Measures Source Control Measures

The assessment of the likely effectiveness of source control also considers pre-flood conditions such as the state of saturation of the soil, and whether or not the ground is frozen
Thus, a potential drawback with some forms of source control, and other forms of land-use modification such as afforestation, is that the capacity to absorb or store rainfall depends on the antecedent conditions of the catchment.

Extensive Measure Vegetative Control

Its beneficial effect lies in decreasing the rate of overland flow, thus hindering runoff and soil erosion. Effect dependent on the type and nature of the land cover. Is a watershed scale measure and might turnout to be an expensive undertaking.

Hydrologic Cycle
Precipitation, P(t)

Runoff, streamflow, Q(t)

Extensive Measure Soil Loss Control

Aimed primarily at minimizing soil erosion from the watershed. Erosion control and soil control at the watershed level are intimately connected. Categories of soil control measures
Vegetative

Extensive Measure Soil Loss Control

Vegetative soil control :
Planting perennial grasses, shrubs and trees , ad mulching

Structural measures include :

Small flood control dams Dikes and levees Stream channel improvements and bank stabilization

Sediment retention basins and outfall structures

Intensive Measure Dikes and Levees

Levees are small earthen dams placed on the floodplain at a certain distance from the banks of a stream to serve as artificial banks during flood periods when the stream overflows its natural banks.

Intensive Measure Dikes and Levees

Hydraulic effects of confining flood waters of a river in between levees are :
To increase the rate at which the flood event travels downstream,
To increase the river stage for a particular flood event, To increase the velocity and the scouring potential through the leveed section.

Intensive Measure Dikes and Levees

Provide the most direct means of flood protection. Can be constructed where needed, affording high degree of protection to a portion of the flood plain. Draw backs :
The increase in flood stages brought upon by the construction of a levee system The uncertainty in the calculation of the maximum

Flood Control - Levee

Intensive Measure Channel Improvement

The purpose of channel improvement is to increase the discharge of a stream in order to enable the flood waters to flow off faster and thus decrease the flood stages and reduce the frequency of flood damage.
Methods for increasing discharge :
Increase the size of the channel

Intensive Measure Channel Improvement

Increasing the size of the channel :
Widen the river channel

Economic factors severely limit its use as a management measure.

Increasing the velocity

Decreasing the roughness of the channel; Increasing the hydraulic radius, and Increasing the slope of the water surface

Intensive Measure Channel Improvement

Decreasing roughness
Channel clearing

Increasing the hydraulic radius :

Can be increased by dredging the channel bed. Building levees

Slope modification
Straightening the channel alignment

Intensive Measures - Reservoirs

Flood control reservoirs provide for temporary storage of the flood waters , limiting the flow downstream to a quantity which the channel can safely carry, thereby preventing floods. Philosophy :
Dampen the peak of the flood by artificial storage and release after the flood event has subsided.

Intensive Measures - Reservoirs

Storage has to be used in an appropriate combination with other structural and nonstructural measures.
Releases from reservoirs can create risks, and the careful operation of reservoirs can minimize the loss of human life and property due to such releases. In this context transboundary cooperation is indispensable.

Intensive Measures - Reservoirs

The storage capacity is dictated by the difference between the rate of inflow and the maximum rate of outflow below the dam.
Reservoirs
Regulated type (storage reservoirs) Unregulated type( detention reservoirs)

Intensive Measures - Reservoirs

Regulated type
Outlet is equipped with power/manually/automatically operated gates

Controlled release of water and excess water is stored until the inflow flood recedes.

Detention reservoir
Has fixed outlet works. Sufficient size to pass freely all normal flow.

Blue Marsh Reservoir near Reading, PA/Photo By U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Philadelphia District

Intensive Measures Floodways and Channel Diversions

Floodways and channel diversions are designed to alleviate the passage of flood wave through the main channel , by providing for the release of some of the excess water to be carried by improving natural channels or artificial channels especially constructed for this purpose.

Intensive Measures Floodways and Channel Diversions

Flood ways :
Water returns to the channel

Channel diversion
Taking flood waters out of the main channel and conveying them into inland lakes, off-channel reservoirs , or directly into the lake/sea.

A comparison of the non

Non Structural Measures

Flood proofing Emergency measures Land use regulation Loss Bearing Public relief Flood insurance

Flood Proofing
Refers to sets of measures designed to reduce the damage to buildings located in the floodplain, in the event of inundation by flood waters.
Three classes :
Permanent Contingency, and

Emergency

Flood Proofing
Permanent measures are those that provide protection against the flood for which they were designed, independent of any human judgment, forecast or action. Contingency measures are those that become effective after the receipt of a warning or forecast and involve human action to some degree. Emergency measures are either improved in the event of a flood , or carried out according

Flood Proofing Measures - Permanent

Seepage control Sewer adjustments Permanente closure Openings protected Interiors protected Elevation Timber Treatment Deliberate Flooding

Flood Proofing Emergency Measures

Refer to all those actions by individuals and the community , whether preplanned or contingent upon the onset of a flood, designed to avert damage to life and property, ad minimize material losses. Types
Removal, Flood fighting, and Rescheduling

Flood Proofing Emergency Measures

Emergency Measures - Rescheduling

Comprises shifts in public service and other production schedules which aim at maintaining service during the flood.
Some measures
Rail and highway traffic Supplying bottled gas for hospitals and other key institutions Emergency repair of eroding highway beds.

Land Use Regulation

Refers to use of regulation to reduce flood losses comprises the set of restrictions placed by legislative bodies upon private and public land uses in flood hazard areas.
Allocate unprotected lands to their most appropriate user and prevent private and public landowners fro burdening other landowners or h genera public it the cost of protecting unwise use of flood prone lands.

Land Use Regulation

Land use management programs cannot prevent all flooding or reduce all flood losses.
Reduce flood losses to acceptable levels however, by altering the course of flood waters and the type of land use patterns. Flood damage are related to both the flood potential at a site and the nature of land use.

Land Use Regulation

Some general classes of land use are more susceptible to flood damage than others. Damage to forestry , agricultural and open spaces is less than to residential or commercial uses. Damage can effectively be reduced if open spaces. Land use planning Land use regulation must be used in combination wit other measures to achieve

Land Use Regulation

Loss Bearing
Los bearing refers to a series of adjustments through which a community rationalizes its occupancy of the flood plain.
The dwellers of the flood plain bear the losses individually.

Public Relief
Refers to the economic measures taken by local, state and federal governments to alleviate the financial hardship of flood plain occupants that have been subjected to a flood. This is an alternative and a substitute for individual losses, where upon the general public shares in the losses of the les fortunate communities.

Flood Insurance
It entails the mechanism by which floodplain occupants purchase institutional protection against undue damage, and become the beneficiaries of private or public insurance in the event of economic loss due to floods

Flood Management
Traditional flood management interventions are listed below:
Source control to reduce runoff (permeable pavements, afforestation, artificial recharge); Storage of runoff (wetlands, detention basins, reservoirs); Capacity enhancement of rivers (bypass channels, channel deepening or widening); Separation of rivers and populations (landuse control, dikes, flood proofing, zoning, house raising);

Flood Management

Emergency management during floods (flood warnings, emergency works to raise or strengthen dikes, flood proofing, evacuation); and Flood recovery (counseling, compensation or insurance).

Flood Management Source Control Measures

Source controls intervene in the process of the formation of runoff from rainfall or snowmelt, and take the form of storage in the soil or via the soil. The use of this strategy normally considers the consequential effects on the erosion process, the time of concentration in the soil and the dynamics of evapotranspiration.