Severe flooding of river floodplains is a natural process, which has occurred in the past and with the rapid global climate change it is expected that more severe and more frequent extreme events will occur in the near future. Hence flood control is an issue of major concern, along with the need to monitor floods in crisis situations. For these reasons, physically based flood simulation models are needed to enable a better understanding of the processes involved in flood events. The dramatic event in the Elbe river during the floods of summer 2002 triggered this MSc study to look at different modeling approaches used in flood simulation. Two different approaches were considered in this thesis, viz. the Sobek1D2D approach, and the fully 2D model. In the first approach the flow in a river is modelled as a one-dimensional flow, and the flow in the floodplain is modeled as a two-dimensional horizontal flow. In the second approach the river and floodplain flows are modelled both as two-dimensional horizontal flows using 2D cells. The inundation of the floodplain can be induced by a deliberate blasting of dikes in order to reduce the flood risk downstream. The resulting flood damages in the floodplain are evaluated by combining flood extent, inundation depth, flow velocities and flood duration with the land use classification derived from the European CORINE database applying Damage Assessment Models. The inundation results from the two different approaches were compared and discussed. An improved 1D2D coupling system is suggested which will improve the capabilities of Sobek to model the flow in wide rivers as well. Recommendations for further work are given in order to improve the quality of the 1D2D and fully 2D modelling concepts in order to have a better representation of the physical system. Keywords: Sobek 1D2D , dike break modelling, flood propagation, Damage Assessment
Back to the list of MSc abstracts