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SUMMARY:ENAC Seminar Series by Dr. Rafael Schmitt
DTSTART:20181220T090000
DTEND:20181220T100000
DTSTAMP:20260921T101712Z
UID:7d3cb8818a6bcdb6d97fa50e3868e43d94ed9c7b7782e37ad30f673a
CATEGORIES:Conferences - Seminars
DESCRIPTION:Dr. Rafael Schmitt\n9:00 – 10:00 – Dr. Rafael Schmitt\nPos
 t-Doctoral Fellow\, Woods Institute for the Environment and Natural Capita
 l Project\, Stanford University\, USA\n \nNetwork-scale modelling of sedi
 ment connectivity for minimizing conflicts between hydropower generation a
 nd dam impacts on river systems \n \nMost domains of river biophysical fu
 nctioning depend on connectivity\, e.g.\, for water\, species\, and sedime
 nt\, within the river network. Dams and reservoirs\, while crucial for ren
 ewable energy generation and water management\, greatly impact connectivit
 y and create significant environmental externalities. With regard to sedim
 ent\, impacts are mutual as sediment accumulation in reservoirs impedes da
 m operation while downstream rivers suffer from a reduction in sediment lo
 ad. However\, impacts of dams on network-scale sediment connectivity are r
 arely reflected in the current planning of hydropower and water infrastruc
 tures\, which commonly proceeds project-by-project and is rarely backed by
  strategic trade-off analyses between dam benefits and their network-scale
  impacts.\n \nIn this talk\, I present progress towards making strategic 
 planning of dams more operational. This research is enabled by CASCADE\, a
  graph-based model for sediment connectivity and dam sediment trapping. CA
 SCADE was designed to leverage scarce field data and remote sensing inform
 ation into quantitative information on sediment connectivity in large rive
 rs. CASCADE’s numerical efficiency allows coupling with tools for operat
 ions research and decision analysis\, such as genetic algorithms\, which a
 re not commonly applied in neither sediment modeling nor hydropower planni
 ng. This talk will focus on the Mekong\, a basin where rapid project-by-pr
 oject construction of dams\, driven by the riparian countries need for ene
 rgy\, is in strong conflict with ecosystem services supported by natural s
 ediment connectivity. In this contested setting\, our results demonstrate 
 how connectivity modeling and strategic optimization of dam portfolios cou
 ld greatly reduce conflicts between dam impacts and hydropower generation 
 in the basin and could be instrumental to identify basin-wide limits for l
 ower-impact hydropower development in the context of optimizing future ren
 ewable energy portfolios.
LOCATION:CM 1 4 https://plan.epfl.ch/?room==CM%201%204
STATUS:CONFIRMED
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