A New Cloud-Based Tool For Assessment Of Rock Scour During Floods At High-Head Dams

Rock scour downstream of high-head dams is more and more frequently occurring. Climate change and related regulatory requirements generate more frequent functioning of both primary and auxiliary dam spillways. Hence, unlined rock masses downstream experience more and more hydraulic stress. Sound prediction of rock scour becomes more and more pertinent. The paper presents a novel cloud-based digital software environment comprising a suite of computational methods for quasi-3D prediction of scour of unprotected rock in plunge pools downstream of high-head dams. The software is capable to assess scour formation as a function of flood duration and determines the risk of scour regression towards the dam foundation. Secondly, the paper presents the application of these novel computational methods to two case studies, i.e. large-scale laboratory scour experiments performed at the hydraulics laboratory of Stellenbosch University, South Africa, and plunge pool scour observed downstream of Chucàs Dam in Costa Rica, following the 2017 tropical storm.