A new two-phase shallow water hydro-sediment-morphodynamic model based on the HLLC solver and the hybrid LTS/GMaTS approach

Abstract

In this paper, we present a new computationally-efficient and high-resolution depth-averaged two-phase flow model for hydro-sediment-morphydynamic processes, featuring an advance over existing models in terms of accuracy and efficiency of numerical solution. Under the framework of finite volume method (FVM) on unstructured grids, the Harten-Lax-van Leer-Contact (HLLC) approximate Riemann solver is proposed to compute inter-cell fluxes by applying the classical upwind HLLC approach to the water-sediment mixture and the sediment phases separately, in contrast to previous two-phase flow models using centered schemes. Moreover, to improve computational efficiency, the local-time-stepping (LTS) approach is implemented, the first attempt in the field of two-phase flow modelling. After a convergence rate study, the model is tested against a series of flow-sediment-bed evolutions induced by (1) two refilling processes of dredged trenches, (2) two instantaneous dam-break flooding flows, and (3) one levee breaching process by overtopping flows. It features encouraging performance when compared to a two-phase flow model based on a centered scheme and global time bound, characterized by more accurate results and much less computational cost. The present modelling framework shows promise in practical shallow water hydro-sediment-morphodynamic modelling applications.