Developing the hydrological dependency structure between streamgage and reservoir networks

Sudarshana Mukhopadhyay,A Sankarasubramanian,Chandramauli Awasthi

doi:10.1038/s41597-020-00660-6

Sudarshana Mukhopadhyay, A Sankarasubramanian + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-020-00660-6

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Abstract

Reliable operation of physical infrastructures such as reservoirs, dikes, nuclear power plants positioned along a river network depends on monitoring riverine conditions and infrastructure interdependency with the river network, especially during hydrologic extremes. Developing this cascading interdependency between the riverine conditions and infrastructures for a large watershed is challenging, as conventional tools (e.g., watershed delineation) do not provide the relative topographic information on infrastructures along the river network. Here, we present a generic geo-processing tool that systematically combines three geospatial layers: topographic information from the National Hydrographic Dataset (NHDPlusV2), streamgages from the USGS National Water Information System, and reservoirs from the National Inventory of Dams, to develop the interdependency between reservoirs and streamgages along the river network for upper and lower Colorado River Basin (CRB) resulting in River and Infrastructure Connectivity Network (RICON) that shows the said interdependency as a concise edge list for the CRB. Another contribution of this study is an algorithm for developing the cascading interdependency between infrastructure and riverine networks to support their management and operation.

Highlights

Background & SummaryUnderstanding the vulnerability of critical infrastructure to natural disasters such as riverine and coastal floods requires hydroclimatic information on the magnitude and frequency of extreme events and their impact on flood control structures)[1,2]
Despite the advances in representing river network with the detailed attributes in high-resolution National Hydrography Dataset[4,5] (NHDPlusV2), there are no tools or software packages available to geospatially represent the infrastructure dependency with streamgages and other entities that rely on the entire river network (Fig. 1)
Using detailed river network information in NHDPlusV2, we develop an algorithm that develops the riverine connectivity between reservoirs and stream gauge for one of the highly dammed river basins, the upper and lower Colorado River basins, from the western US

Summary

Background & Summary

Understanding the vulnerability of critical infrastructure to natural disasters such as riverine and coastal floods requires hydroclimatic information on the magnitude and frequency of extreme events and their impact on flood control structures (e.g., reservoirs, levees, and dikes))[1,2]. The dependency of critical infrastructures (e.g., reservoirs, power plants) across the riverine network must be known as a priori for operation and management Developing this interdependency information requires geospatial referencing of the critical infrastructure with the riverine network. Hydrolinks13– an R14 package – was developed to demonstrate the usefulness of this high-resolution dataset in linking water quality monitoring gages to streams and lakes[13] It did not identify the upstream-to-downstream dependency. This study aims to develop an algorithm for identifying the interdependent structure between the streamgage network and reservoir network for large river basins using the comprehensive river network attributes available from NHDPlusV2. The presented algorithm in R14 Reservoirs-Infrastructure Cascade (RIC), develops a tree data structure that provides the parent-child relationship between reservoirs and stream gages over the entire river basin as RICON database[17]. We discuss the validation of the database and its availability and data retrieval

Methods

Data Preparation

Findings

Network Analysis