Author(s)

A. Turgeon

Abstract

Optimal daily operation of reservoirs subject to probabilistic flood constraints A. Turgeon Hydro-Que'bec Varennes, Quk, Canada Abstract This paper addresses the problem of determining the optimal daily operating policy of a river system subject to probabilistic flood constraints. This optimization problem is stochastic because streamflows are random. One of the difficulties is to take into account the streamflow persistence and, more specifically, the fact that there may be several consecutive days of high flow. This is important because floods usually occur during those periods. Unfortunately, the techniques for solving stochastic optimization problems cannot generally take into account long persistence. This paper presents a method that solves the problem in two steps. The first step determines flood control rule curves for the reservoirs that take into account streamflow persistence. Any reservoir operating policy that respects these rule c w e s satisfies the probabilistic flood constraint

Keywords