Energy storage and major floods

Can pumped-hydro storage reduce flood risk?

Pumped-Hydro Storage (P-HS) technology has received some significant attention in energy storage. However, its application towards flood risk mitigation is a new dimension, which merits consideration given some of the technical characteristics and the system’s components.

Does floodplain storage reduce risk?

The results show that floodplain storage is significant, lowers water levels and discharges, and reduces risks by over 50%. Therefore, for accurate risk assessments, a system approach must be adopted, and floodplain storage and hydrodynamic interactions must carefully be considered. Editor A. Castellarin Associate Editor A. Domeneghetti

Do dike failures affect floodplain storage?

These approaches account for floodplain storage effects caused by inundation considering or disregarding dike failures. Apel et al. (2004) and Vorogushyn et al. (2010, 2012) indicated the effect of hydrodynamic interactions on flood hazard and risk at the Lower Rhine and a small reach of the Elbe River, respectively, due to dike failures.

Is P-HS a nexus for flood risk mitigation?

However, its application towards flood risk mitigation is a new dimension, which merits consideration given some of the technical characteristics and the system’s components. This study draws on a synthesis of the existing body of knowledge to postulate the potential nexus between P-HS operation and flood risk mitigation.

How does a large river network affect flood risk assessment?

In a larger river network, it results in inconsistent, non-mass conservative sets of flood hydrographs, inundation areas, and risk estimates (Curran et al. 2020). Reach-wise or piece-wise routing is still common for many large-scale risk assessment studies (Alfieri et al. 2016, Quinn et al. 2019).

Does a continuous 1D routing scheme reduce flood risk?

To do so, we compare a new continuous 1D routing scheme within a flood risk model chain to the piece-wise routing scheme, which largely neglects floodplain storage. The results show that floodplain storage is significant, lowers water levels and discharges, and reduces risks by over 50%.