Thesis supervisor: Tamás Krámer
Location of studies (in Hungarian): BME Vízépítési és Vízgazdálkodási Tanszék Abbreviation of location of studies: BMEVV
Description of the research topic:
A considerable flow can infiltrate from river floods into the soil which has multiple beneficial effects: among others, it ensures the soil moisture requirements of riparian ecosystems, replenishes the soil with minerals and contributes to the attenuation of extreme floods.
The connection between surface waters and soil moisture is an essential element of the water budget of rainfall catchments, waterlogged floodplains and irrigated agricultural lands, and so, has long been a thoroughly researched topic (Clemmens & Bautista 2009, Tayfur 1993). In river valleys studies have focused on the effect on soils and indirectly on ecological habitats or groundwater resources (Sorman et al. 1995). However, few publications (e.g. Bateman et al. 2010 for urban flash floods) deal with the opposite direction of this interaction. Nevertheless, theoretical considerations and indirect hydrographic experiences (e.g. on the upper Hungarian reaches of the Rába and the Danube Rivers) seem to confirm that infiltration into soil appreciably lowers surface water levels of floods with a long residence time.
Infiltration can be separated into a horizontal and a vertical process:
• over the flooded terrain surface waters saturate the unsaturated upper soil layer (Sorman et al. 1995),
• and the groundwater table rises laterally (Ubell 1964, Kukucska et al. 2015).
A significant difference between the two processes is that the vertical infiltration manifests itself as a residual loss for the surface waters whereas a major part of the horizontal groundwater wave is stored only temporarily in the soil and returns to the river during the falling limb of the hydrograph. Together, these processes delay, attenuate and partially consume river flood waves.
The main objectives of the research:
• explore the consequences of the interaction between river and soil on the flood dynamics of the river, then
• recommend a general methodology to consider these consequences in the evaluation of river flood hazard.
Steps towards these objectives:
• Estimate the rate of infiltration from river and groundwater hydrographs.
• Reproduce the processes with combinations of physical and numerical models of different complexity, and identify those that yield the best relationship between number of parameters, computational cost and attainable accuracy.
• Estimate the magnitude, the parameter sensitivity and the uncertainty (e.g. by adapting the procedure of Rousseau et al. 2012) of the effect of river-soil interaction on diverse rivers.
Number of students who can be accepted: 1
Deadline for application: 2018-05-31
2024. IV. 17. ODT ülés Az ODT következő ülésére 2024. június 14-én, pénteken 10.00 órakor kerül sor a Semmelweis Egyetem Szenátusi termében (Bp. Üllői út 26. I. emelet).
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