Inland Navigation Networks Research Articles

Modeling of interconnected flat open-channel flow: application to inland navigation canals

Inland navigation networks are composed of several artificial canals, usually characterized by no slope. These canals are large-scale systems that can be accurately described by means of the nonlinear Saint-Venant partial differential equations. However, the lack of an analytical solution for these equations is one of the reasons why simplified models have been developed. In this work, the Integrator-Delay-Zero model is used as the input-output model to link the water depths to the discharges. A modeling extension for a canal with inflows and outflows along the water stream is proposed: an overlapping problem is discussed and a criterion choice is defined in order to obtain the general model. With regard to this criterion, a calibration step is needed, both to overcome the natural limitations of the simplified model and to ensure the correct computation of the general model. The application of this modeling approach to a part of the inland navigation network in the north of France serves as the case study for this work.

Modeling and fault diagnosis of flat inland navigation canals

This article regards the development of an analytical redundancy-based approach for detecting and isolating both sensor and actuator faults in flat inland navigation canals. Inland navigation networks are principally used for transport and are composed of many canalized natural rivers and artificial canals characterized by no slope. These canals are strongly affected by resonance phenomena, which can create waves such that the navigation condition might not be guaranteed. It is, therefore, required to ensure dealing with fault-free measured data and actuators. The proposed approach is based on the integrator delay zero model of the flat inland navigation canal. The proposed method is tested by considering the Cuinchy–Fontinettes navigation reach (in the north of France) to detect and isolate the occurrence of faults in the Cuinchy and Fontinettes level sensors and in the Cuinchy gate.

Sensor fault diagnosis in inland navigation networks based on a grey-box model

Inland navigation networks are equipped with limnimeters to measure and record water level data for the control of water levels and the management of water resources. When faults occur on sensors, corrupted data can be considered as correct, leading to undesirable management actions. Therefore, it is necessary to detect and localize these faults. In this paper, the detection and localization of sensor faults is performed through the analysis of the parameters of a grey-box model, which are obtained from available real data. The parameters are determined with a sliding window, with the exception of the delays, which are considered known a priori. A fault is detected and then localized when there is a change in the value of the parameters. This approach is well suited for constant faults and particularly well adapted for intermittent faults. Data of an inland navigation reach located in the north of France are used to highlight the performance of the proposed approach.

Study of Global Change Impacts on the Inland Navigation Management: Application on the Nord-Pas de Calais Network

In a global change context, governments in Europe want to promote alternative transports as inland navigation or railway instead of road transport. As example, in north of France, a shift of 20% from road transport to these alternative transport solutions is expected by 2050. Reaching this goal requires not only the delivery of new infrastructures and equipment, but also the design of efficient management strategies. By focusing on waterborne transport, it is thus necessary to improve the management of the inland navigation networks particularly the water resource. Indeed, the waterborne transport accommodation is strongly linked to the available water resource. This will be a challenging point in a global change context.The paper deals with the global change impacts on inland navigation networks. It aims at proposing new contributions as compared to past and current results of European projects on climate change and inland navigation. It appeared that the multi-scale modeling approach for inland navigation networks that was proposed during the last TRA Conference in Paris in 2014 is useful to determine the resilience of these networks and their ability to guarantee the navigation conditions during drought and flood periods. The proposed tools are developed to consider two space and time scales. The first approach is used to determine the water quantity that is necessary to accommodate the navigation during half a day, and the second allows the efficient control of the gates to keep the water level of each navigation reach close to its setpoint by rejecting disturbances and compensating the waves due to the lock operations. One example based on the real inland navigation network of the north of France is used to highlight the contributions of the multi-scale modeling approach.

A Global Approach For Investigating Resilience In Inland Navigation Network Dealing With Climate Change Context

At the European scale, inland navigation waterway transport is considered as a competitive and environment friendly alternative to road and rail transport. This transport mode is promoting in north of France thanks to the building of the Canal Seine-Nord. The number of boats and the navigation scheduling will increase significantly. A big raise of the required water volume is waited. Overcoming this future navigation demand will be particularly challenging in a climate change context. Hence, a crucial step consists in investigating the resilience of the inland navigation networks considering the future navigation demand and the climate change impacts. The main objective of this paper is to present the tools dedicated to the resilience determination that is required to design adaptive management strategies of these networks. An integrated model is proposed to model the network and to identify and quantify water supplies and water intakes. Then, a generalized flow-based network is used to model the water volume dispatching. The water dispatching has to be optimized according to the network resilience against the increase of navigation demand, and against the decrease of available water resource particularly during drought periods. Due to the complex structure of the networks, uncertainties that are linked to the daily number of boat and to the available water resource, an interesting approach will consist in defining a distributed problem. Local virtual agents will be designed to manage each waterway section, and a global coordination process will guarantee the efficient management of the network. The tools are designed and tested considering the inland navigation network in north of France.

Constraint satisfaction problem based on flow graph to study the resilience of inland navigation networks in a climate change context

The T-Ten European program aims at optimizing the transport logistics in Europe by promoting alternative transport modes. Navigation transport offers a competitive and environmentally friendly alternative. Hence, it is foresaw an increase of the navigation transport demand that it will be necessary to accommodate. This will be very challenging particularly in a global change context where less available water resource is expected. A constraint satisfaction problem based on flow graph is proposed in this paper to study the resilience of inland navigation networks against increase of the navigation demand and extreme events. Drought and flood scenarios are simulated considering an network composed of five interconnected navigation reaches. The results show that the designed tools are well adapted to the resilience study of inland navigation networks.

Gray-Box Model of Inland Navigation Channel: Application to the Cuinchy–Fontinettes Reach

AbstractIn a context of global change, inland navigation transport has gained interest with economic and environmental benefits. The development of this means of conveyance requires the improvement of its management rules to deal with the increase of navigation (schedules and frequency) and the potential impact of global change. To achieve this aim, it is first necessary to have a better knowledge about the dynamics of inland navigation networks and their interaction with the environment. Second, the potential effects of global change have to be anticipated. This article focuses on the modeling of inland navigation reaches. An inland navigation network is a large-scale distributed system composed of several interconnected reaches. These reaches are characterized by non-linearities, time delays, and generally no significant slope. To deal with these particularities, a gray-box model is proposed. It consists in determining the delays according to the physical characteristics of the system. The parameters of the model are identified with measured data. The gray-box model is used to reproduce the dynamics of the Cuinchy–Fontinettes reach located in the north of France.

Sensor fault diagnosis of inland navigation system using physical model and pattern recognition approach

In recent years, inland navigation networks benefit from the innovation of the instrumentation and SCADA systems. These data acquisition and control systems lead to a reactive asset-management of inland navigation networks. However, sensors and actuators are subject to faults due to the strong effects of the environment, aging, etc. In this paper, a sensor Fault Detection and Isolation (FDI) approach is proposed using an Integrator-Delay-Zero (IDZ) model, interval observers and the dynamic classification algorithm AUDyC. The combined use of these approaches allows the improvement of the sensor fault diagnosis. The proposed approach is introduced through the case study of the Cuinchy-Fontinettes reach in the north of France.

Large-scale system control based on decentralized design. Application to Cuinchy Fontinette Reach

Abstract Large scale engineering systems are typically composed by several subsystems that interact with each other as a result of material, energy and information flows. A high performance control technology such as decentralized control can be employed for control this class of systems. An optimal decentralized control architecture is presented in this paper in order to ensure the efficient management of an inland navigation network in a global change context. For further logic, we show that if the subsystems present a connectivity from one to another, suitable local feedback action provided by these subsystem (decentralized controllers) may be sufficient if the subsystems are connected. Stabilizability (resp. stability) conditions are given for perfectly decoupled and interconnected coupled (by connectivity parameters) subsystems.

Adaptive and predictive control architecture of inland navigation networks in a global change context: application to the Cuinchy-Fontinettes reach

In this paper, an adaptive and predictive control architecture is proposed to improve the management of inland navigation networks in a global change context. This architecture aims at ensuring the seaworthiness conditions of inland navigation networks, and to improve the efficiency of the water resource management. It is based on supervision and prognosis modules which allow the estimation of the current state of the network, and the forecasting of the extreme event occurrence. According to these indicators and to the management constraints and objectives, control strategies of the inland navigation networks will be adapted to limit the impacts of the extreme events. To achieve this aim, three challenges are considered and discussed in this paper. The first one consists in proposing an accurate modeling approach of navigation reaches which are characterized by large scale, nonlinearities, time delays, unknown inputs and outputs, etc. The second one is to increase the knowledge about potentiality of extreme events, consequences of the climate change. The prediction of these events is rather complex due to their rarity, the spacio-temporal scale of the networks, etc. Finally, the third one is the pooling of the two first contributions, i.e. the model of the system and the knowledge about extreme events. Thus, the resilience of the system and the adaptation of the management strategies could be realized.

Yangtze River: China's golden waterway

The 6380 km long Yangtze River is the longest in China and third longest in the world. With more than 3600 branches it provides a total of 65 000 km of waterways, over half of the country's inland navigation network. This paper describes China's ‘golden waterway’ and its huge national and regional economic benefits. It reports on the recent channel improvement projects on the trunk line, including the Three Gorges dam and major estuary works, which have significantly increased both reliability and capacity – and resulted in a direct stimulus to economic growth. A further £4 billion of improvements are now planned.