Reference no: EM133749170
Advanced Water Engineering
Catchment Analysis Project
Learning Outcome 1: Compile information from prescribed sources to inform the solution of a water engineering system problem at a developed level
Learning Outcome 2: Solve a water engineering system problem theoretically at a developed level.
Learning Outcome 3: Model the behaviour of a water engineering system using a computational approach at a developed level.
Learning Outcome 4: Contribute to a water engineering assessment, with evidence of working on agreed tasks as a team member, at a developed level.
Learning Outcome 5: Compose a structured technical report of a water engineering project including design calculations and design drawings at a developed level.
Overview
The Samford Ecological Research Facility (SERF) site is located approximately 3 km south east of Samford Township and 25km from Brisbane (see figure below). The site is located in close proximity to Samford Creek and waterways flowing into Samford Creek. In order to satisfy the growth of residential demand within the region, the owners of the SERF site are currently exploring options for a sustainable residential development.
A concept plan for the residential development is already proposed by the developer and available for you in electronic format GIS layers. This plan is only a conceptual design, proposed based on the client's sustainable and green living objectives. The details of this plan are not yet assessed against any basic engineering requirements. Your hydrologic and hydraulic engineering consulting company has been tasked with analysing the catchment, assessing the current conceptual plan against engineering requirements, and providing recommendations to the developer.
What you will do
Outline
You will form groups of 4 or 5 and operate as a hydrologic and hydraulic engineering consultancy. Over the semester you will use various methods and techniques to analyse the catchment.
Task 1 is a preliminary investigation to assess the suitability of proposed land development plan against hydrologic and hydraulic scenarios. In this task, you are advised to use Rational Method to estimate design flood peaks. You will present your findings to the client at the Feedback Session in week 5.
Task 2 is a detailed assessment of flood scenarios and design of the creek crossing proposed in the concept plan. You are required to use hydrologic and hydraulic modelling software (Mike 11) to undertake a detailed assessment of flood scenarios. Use the estimated design flood information to demarcate the flood prone areas within proposed urban development. Use the estimations from modelling software to design a culvert structure for this location so that the safety of the upstream and downstream properties is ensured. You will present you findings, recommendations, and culvert design in professional engineering report due in Week 12.
Group Formation Rules
Forming groups is the students' responsibility. Prescribed group size for this project is 4 or 5 students. Groups other than the prescribed size will not be accepted. All groups will have same workload irrespective of the group size (having only 4 members will not be an excuse for lowered total workload or quality of the work). To form groups, you first need to discuss with peers. You can then register your group in Blackboard / Tools / Groups portal. Please speak to your peers as soon as possible to form groups. Group work will commence from Week 2 and having a definite group will be an advantage. If you failed to allocate yourself into a group, unit coordinator will allocate you to a group before the start of Week 4. This is to facilitate effective group functionality.
Once you are allocated to a group, the project that you should be undertaking is as outlined in Table below. Details of 5 available projects will be introduced to you in Week 2, Studio classes (TU2).
Task 1 - Feedback Session
The primary objective of Task 1 is to investigate the suitability of proposed land development plan against hydrologic and hydraulic scenarios. In this Task, you will be identifying critical areas of the concept plan for flooding, demarcating primary tributaries and the catchment. You are advised to use empirical methods such as Rational Method for basic estimations of peak runoff in the critical points.
It is a requirement to prevent frequent inundation of private properties and access routes in residential developments. This is primarily achieved during design stages of residential developments. As recommended in AR&R, no inundation of private properties or access routes is permissible for minor design storm events. For this purpose, Samford site developer is requesting you to estimate peak design flood for AEP equivalent to 1 in 10 years as minor design storm. You may consider the upstream catchment land use as rural for this task. It is also a requirement to avoid catastrophic flood damage to proposed residential development during major design storm events. In typical designs, inundation of important properties is accepted for major (extreme) storm events provided that catastrophic failures are avoided. Therefore, it has become land developers' responsibility to provide adequate information on flood dangers and safety procedures to follow during major flood events. To facilitate this, Samford site developer is requesting you to estimate peak design flood for AEP equivalent to 1 in 100 years as major design storm event. You may consider the upstream catchment land use as rural for this task.
Deliverables Schedule and Task Instructions:
Workload Allocation Model
Review the CAP tasks and deliverables and develop a workload allocation model which equally shares the workload for the semester.
Catchment map with demarcated catchment boundary
Demarcate the entire catchment contributing to the runoff in the tributary. Consider the point at which the proposed road in the concept plans crossing the main tributary (within the limits of development site) as the point of interest for catchment demarcation.
Measurements and calculations for basic catchment parameters
Measure and calculate basic hydrologic parameters including catchment area, longest drainage length and equal area slope.
IFD curves or table developed for proposed site
Peak Runoff Calculations
Estimate runoff rates at point of interest for AEP equivalent to 1 in 10 years and 1 in 100 years using the Rational Method and assuming rural catchment conditions. Calculations (including working) should cover equal area slope, time of concentration, rainfall intensities, runoff coefficients, and peak runoffs.
The above deliverables must be brought to the Week 5 Feedback Session and presented in a neat and professional manner. It is important for all group members to have a comprehensive understanding of the activities undertaken. The staff member will provide an indication of the quality of the tasks undertaken and may ask you to explain the analytical procedures undertaken. At the end of the feedback session, the assessor will provide you a completed submission page.
This primarily outlines the quality of the tasks you have completed and discussed during the event. You should submit completed submission page to relevant Blackboard submission portal to main records.
Task 2- Catchment Analysis Report
The primary objectives of Task 2 are to undertake detailed assessments of flood scenarios for major and minor storm events and to design a culvert structure for the creek crossing proposed in the concept plan. You are required to use hydrologic and hydraulic modelling software (Mike 11) for detailed assessment of flood scenarios. Estimations from modelling software can be then used in designing the culvert structure for creek crossing so that the safety of the upstream and downstream properties is ensured.
In Australian industrial practice, undertaking a detailed hydrologic and hydraulic assessment of proposed developments using computer modelling approaches is common. Flood estimations using Rational Method are considered not reliable and only used as a complementary assessment tool. Outcomes of computer modelling provide reliable estimations of flood peaks, water depths and velocities, which are essential parameters to determine safety and sustainability of proposed developments.
Designing culverts and bridges for creek crossings are essential tasks in hydrologic and hydraulic assessments for urban developments. In a creek or a tributary, the presence of any form of obstacle (such as a culvert) leads to changes in water levels and flow characteristics. These changes to water level and flow characteristics and subsequent impacts to the development and impacts to the surrounding environment should be considered during culvert design. It is required to estimate such changes accurately to facilitate the detailed design of culvert features.
In this project, you are required to setup a Mike 11 model for the catchment and simulate it for design flood scenarios to obtain necessary flow characteristics for the design. Design flood scenarios are AEP equivalent to 1 in 10 years (minor event) and 1 in 100 years (major event).
Models should be simulated for selected durations in all possible temporal patterns (this information will be separately provided to you). Based on the flow characteristics obtained for AEP equivalent to 1 in 10 years, you will design a culvert structure to provide a safe passage across the tributary. You should accommodate 500mm freeboard. Developer agrees to raise the culvert crown (level of the road centreline) and/or widen the creek cross section to accommodate larger number of culvert elements if necessary. However, you should ensure that the structure is cost effective and environmentally friendly. You are not required to do a detailed cost estimation, but a simple assessment based on cut and fill is sufficient.
Task Instructions:
Read project outline and Task 1 and 2 sheets to understand the required tasks. Plan your work and share workload using ‘workload allocation model'.
Sub-divide the catchment based on the drainage path and cross sections given in the original GIS files and already demarcated catchment boundary. Obtain catchment characteristics such as surface area for each sub catchment. You should use this information to develop a conceptual drainage arrangement for the model development.
Obtain cross section details of at critical points of the creek such as point of interest, upstream and downstream of the proposed culvert and points in close proximity to the development. You may also need cross section data in regular intervals within the development. You can use the contour map provided to obtain these cross-section details. It is mandatory to use three given cross sections. A total of 6-8 cross sections is normally sufficient. Please only consider the drainage path outlined in the original QGIS drawing for Mike 11 modelling.
Develop a computer model for the catchment using Mike 11 software. You will require both catchment information and cross section details for this.
Calibration parameters for your Mike 11 model is provided to you. Use the values provided before simulations.
Simulate model for AEP equivalent to 1 in 10 year and 100 year events. You are advised to simulate only 4 standard durations around the time of concentration calculated during Task 1 (this includes simulation of Rainfall-Runoff module and Hydrodynamic module).
Process data to obtain median peak runoffs for 1 in 10 year and 1 in 100 year AEPs.
Draw flood envelope in the plane view for AEP equivalent to 10 year and 100 year events. You will have to use the water depth information from each cross section in Mike 11 model for this.
The flood envelope may show that some lots on the developer's conceptual plan are at risk of inundation during 1 in 10 year and 1 in 100 year events. Recommendations should be made to the developer on how the lots in the conceptual development plan can be reconfigured to make best use of the land.
Design appropriate culvert arrangements so that the design flood can pass through safely. You may raise the road centreline and/or widen the creek cross section if necessary. Include other culvert features such as erosion and sedimentation control measures and safe passages for animals. You are not required to undertake detailed design for these features.
Plot detailed drawings of the final culvert arrangement. Drawings can be developed in AutoCAD (or similar), dimensions should be provided, and key features labelled.
Audit the tasks undertaken and prepare workload audit model based on the tasks you have undertaken
Deliverables Schedule (items to be included in the Catchment Analysis Report):
Workload Allocation Model and Audit
Catchment map with demarcated catchment and sub-catchment boundary
Measurements and calculations for basic catchment parameters including catchment / sub-catchment areas, drainage lengths and equal area slope.
IFD curves or table developed for the proposed site and rainfall temporal patterns obtained for model simulations.
Peak Runoff Calculations using Rational Method. Calculations should cover time of concentration, runoff coefficients, and peak runoffs.
Mike 11 RR model development and simulation. This includes processing rainfall records for model simulations and tabulating RR simulation outcomes for HD simulation
Details of Mike 11 HD model development and simulation. This includes the development of network, cross sections, boundary and input file formats.
HD Model simulation and use of simulated outcomes to estimate flood peaks equivalent to 1 in 10 year AEP and 1 in 100 year AEP design scenarios. These estimations should be comparable with Rational Method outcomes.
Plots of flood envelopes based on water depths for critical cross sections around the planned development.
Recommended changes to the conceptual plan based on the flood envelopes.
Culvert design: This should include culvert design calculations using prescribed design guideline with charts and tables.
Detailed drawings of the proposed culvert arrangement.
Detailed discussion of the calculation and design procedure adopted, comparison between Rational Method outcomes and model outcomes, recommended changes to the development plan, features added to the culvert structure and environmental considerations and sustainability of the development.
Report Style and Formatting Requirements:
You are required to write a professional engineering report for this submission. This report should be a stand-alone report where reader can gain complete information without referring to any other document. Your report is primarily an analytical/design report where you have to include your calculations and decisions made based on calculations into the main text rather than appendices.
Report should format according to typical reporting guidelines expected in a professional engineering report.
Report should include a title page, executive summary, table of contents, table of figures, table of tables, table of equations, introduction chapter, appropriate number of chapters as the body of the report, conclusion chapter, reference list, and appendix.
Referencing style shall be QUT APA.
Figures, tables, and equations should be labelled.
Calculations and equations should be neatly displayed using the MS Word Equation Tool (or similar).
Body text should be 11pt or 12pt and a professional font such as Times New Roman, Arial or Calibri should be used.
You may develop headings and sections based on how you choose to logically present the deliverables to the client.
Criteria for Assessment
Understanding of theory and principals and their applications in decision making
Creativity competency and accuracy in solving water engineering problems
Effective, clear and orderly communication