Joaquino, Jevykisse P.

CE 69–Engineering Hydrology
BSCE – 4B Prof. Renaldo G. Juan

EXERCISE NO. 2 – Water Resources Engineering (WRE) Problems and Hydrology

From the given matrix of WRE problems to which hydrology can provide answers,

1. Discuss the parameters required to answer the question “How much water is
needed?” in the design and operation of the required facilities for Water Supply,
Irrigation, Hydropower, Navigation, and Pollution Control.

WATER RESOURCES ENGINEERING

Water resource engineers work with water. They determine how much water is
needed, where water is available and how much is available, and then determine how to
transport water to where it is needed. They design works to control the flow of water, such as
canals, dams, levees, diversions, and drainage channels and ditches. Other water resource
projects might include protecting beaches from erosion, keeping harbors clear of silt, and
locks and dams for navigation. Water resource engineers often work on multi-purpose
projects that provide benefits such as flood control, hydroelectric power, recreation,
irrigation, water supply, and enhancing the environment. Water resource projects might even
include fountains and water slides.

WATER SUPPLY
Water supply is the process of providing water in a systematic way through installed
pumps and pipe lines. Before water is provided to a specific area, it undergoes a process
called sanitation to ensure that the quality of water received is safe for human consumption.

Municipal Water is commonly called as “Tap Water”. In most developed countries,

water is supplied to households and industries using underground pipes. That water is
processed and treated to meet drinking water standards, even though only a very small
proportion is consumed or used in food preparation. The rest is used for things like bathing,
watering gardens, cleaning, and cooking.
A water supply system typically includes:

 A drainage basin (see water purification - sources of drinking water).

 A raw water collection point (above or below ground) where the water accumulates,
such as a lake, a river, or groundwater from an underground aquifer. Raw water may
be transferred using uncovered ground-level aqueducts, covered tunnels or
underground water pipes to water purification facilities.
  Water purification facilities. Treated water is transferred using water pipes (usually
underground).
 Water storage facilities such as reservoirs, water tanks, or water towers. Smaller water
systems may store the water in cisterns or pressure vessels. Tall buildings may also
need to store water locally in pressure vessels in order for the water to reach the upper
floors.
 Additional water pressurizing components such as pumping stations may need to be
situated at the outlet of underground or above ground reservoirs or cisterns (if gravity
flow is impractical).
 A pipe network for distribution of water to the consumers (which may be private
houses or industrial, commercial or institution establishments) and other usage points
(such as fire hydrants).
 Connections to the sewers (underground pipes, or aboveground ditches in some
developing countries) are generally found downstream of the water consumers, but
the sewer system is considered to be a separate system, rather than part of the water
supply system.

IRRIGATION
The key to maximizing irrigation efforts is uniformity. The producer has a lot of
control over how much water to supply and when to apply it but the irrigation system
determines uniformity. Deciding which irrigation systems is best for your operation requires
knowledge of equipment, system design, plant species, growth stage, root structure, soil
composition, and land formation. Irrigation systems should encourage plant growth while
minimizing salt imbalances, leaf burns, soil erosion, and water loss. Losses of water will
occur due to evaporation, wind drift, run-off and water (and nutrients) sinking deep below the
root zone.

HYDROPOWER

Hydroelectric energy can be defined as a form of hydropower where the motion of

running water (kinetic energy) is converted into electricity.The water cycle is driven directly
by solar energy. When the sun heats the water in the ocean, some of the water on the surface
is vaporized. The water vapor rises and when it reaches higher layers of air and is cooled, the
water falls down in the form of rain, hail or snow. The water flows in streams and rivers,
finally reaching the sea where it again evaporates

Hydropower - The component civil structures of a typical hydropower project are;

 Depending on its height, the dam or weir is constructed for the purpose of impounding
water (reservoir), create additional head and allow diversion of water;
 The spillway is the structure that will pass the flood in excess of what can be stored in
the reservoir. The spillway is usually designed to pass the maximum flood possible;
 The intake structure allows entry of water from the reservoir or the river;
 The power conduit which could either be a tunnel or an open channel or canal or pipes
transports water from the reservoir to the turbine units inside the powerhouse;
 The powerhouse or the power station houses the turbine, generator units and other
associated equipment.
  The tailrace is the structure which will conduct water after running the turbine back to
the river;
 The switchyard which will transform the kinetic energy generated to electric energy;
 The associated transmission line which will conduct the electric energy to the nearest
substation for distribution;

NAVIGATION
A lock is a device used for raising and lowering boats, ships and
other watercraft between stretches of water of different levels on river and canal waterways.
The distinguishing feature of a lock is a fixed chamber in which the water level can be varied;
whereas in a caisson lock, a boat lift, or on a canal inclined plane, it is the chamber itself
(usually then called a caisson) that rises and falls. Locks are used to make a river more easily
navigable, or to allow a canal to cross land that is not level. Later canals used more and larger
locks to allow a more direct route to be taken.

POLLUTION CONTROL
The practice of the profession of civil engineering has from its inception been
intimately associated and concerned with technical problems resulting from and relating to
urbanization. The practice of civil engineering is concerned with preliminary surveys of
needs, design, construction, operation and maintenance of "works" involving transportation
(including rail, highway, pipe line, airports, waterways and harbor facilities), storm and
sanitary drainage, water supply and treatment, sanitation, waste treatment and disposal and
such important ancillary functions to the above as soils and foundations, hydraulics,
engineering mechanics, measurements and structural design. The civil engineer is frequently
involved in municipal planning and management by virtue of his competence in the
composite technology relating to urbanization. Although the civil engineer is committed to
expressing his technical competence in the area of urban development, civil engineering
leadership is growing increasingly concerned about the profession's apparently declining role
in the areas of urban planning and building technology.
Reservoir inflow (input), Q, represented by the natural regime of streamflow
at the dam site. Mathematically it is represented by time series of flows and parameters derived from
them (mean, coefficient of variation, coefficient of skewness, serial correlation coefficients,
models of intra-year distribution, etc.) and generalized characteristics (type of probabilistic
distribution and model of time behaviour).

The parameters that have great practical importance in water resources management and
planning for preliminary estimates of storage capacities as well as cases when economic data
for detailed optimization analysis of reservoirs when not available are occurrence-based
dependability, timebased dependability and quantity-based dependability.
a. Occurrence-based dependability is given as:
 where m is the number of failure years and n is the total number of years considered. It is the
frequency of occurrence of such failures.
b. Timebased dependability is the total duration of failures within the whole period of reservoir
operation.

where T is the length of the whole period of reservoir operation, and change in T is
the duration of a single failure period.
c. quantity-based dependability is the most relevant to water management and economic
analysis of a given scheme of low-flow regulation. it is the ratio of the actual amount of water
delivered to the amount that would be delivered if no failures occurred.

where change in W is the quantity of water not delivered during a single failure
period.

For irrigation, hydrologic parameters are evapotranspiration and Soil water content.
Evapotranspiration consists of evaporation from soil and water bodies and loss of water from plant
leaves, which is called transpiration. It is a major component of the hydrologic cycle and its
information is needed to design irrigation projects and for managing water quality and other
environmental concerns.

The status and fluxes of water in the terrestrial system are controlled by hydrological
processes, which mainly take place in a thin layer of soil covering the Earth surface.
Although the water content of this thin layer is only about 0.05% of the total fresh water on
Earth [Shiklomanov, 1993], it plays a decisive role in controlling the major hydrological,
biogeochemical, and energy exchange processes that take place at the land surface [Katul et
al., 2012]

2. Discuss the parameters of the hydrologic elements (minimum flow, annual yield, flood
peaks, flood volume, baseflow) to answer the question “How much water can be
expected?” for the recommendation studies and facilities required.
Minimum Flow Parameter (s):
If observation data are available, the statistical parameters of probability curves of
minimum monthly discharges during the year (separately for summer and winter) are
determined in the same way as the parameters of annual flow, except that the regional ratios
Cs/Cv fluctuate over a broader range than for onnual flow
Annual Yield Parameter (s):
Total runoff from a project catchment over the period of 1 year is called the
annual yield. It represents the total runoff volume from the catchment. Two
parameters of this are the mean and the variance (or, derived from it, the coefficient of
variation) characterizing, respectively, central tendency and variability of annual
runoff. Estimates of these two parameters are easily obtained from empirical data as
well as estimates of their errors. central tendency and variability of annual runoff.
The Coefficient of Variation of annual precipitation is an index of climatic risk,
indicating a likelihood of fluctuations in reservoir storage or crop yield from year to
year. CV is a measure of relative variability. It is the ratio of the standard deviation to
the mean (average).

Asymmetry is an intrinsic property of runoff distribution. A simple characteristic of

asymmetry is the distance from the mean to the mode, but the most generally employed
parameter is the coefficient of asymmetry, or coefficient of skewness, C. Its estimate from
an n-year series of annual runoffs is given by

Standard error of C (Q) strongly depends on the distribution of the original S variable
Q, so that without knowing the distribution of annual runoff in advance one does not know
how accurate the estimate of C is. On the other hand, without knowing s the limits within
which C can be expected, one can hardly judge the type of distribution of Q.

Flood Peaks and Flood Volume Parameters

The most evident and often the most important flood parameter is its
peak discharge. Peak stream discharge is a hydrologic parameter that is very important for
the determination of flood risk, design of engineering works, and management of water
resources.
Flood elevation is the maximum elevation of water level encountered during the
flood. it is the most important characteristic since it decides whether the banks will be
overtoppedo Hydrologically, this characteristic is not the most suitable one for flood
evaluation since it varies from paint to point and is a characteristic of a given river cross-
section rather than one of the flood wave moving along the rivero Also, flood elevation is not
always the best indicator of flood harmfulness.
REFERENCES:
Hydroelectric Power. 2005. Retrieved from https://www.usbr.gov/power/edu/pamphlet.pdf
WVIC. 2018. Retrieved from http://www.wvic.com/content/how_hydropower_works.cfm

Hydropower. 2009. Retrieved from

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/global-warming/hydropower/

http://www.vssut.ac.in/lecture_notes/lecture1424715183.pdf
http://dergipark.gov.tr/download/article-file/385504