Document Type
Presentation
Publication Date
8-1-2014
Abstract
Pollutant mixing in natural rivers is analyzed by using the two-dimensional depth-averaged advection-dispersion model (2D ADE) for rapid completion of the vertical mixing. The dispersion term in the 2D ADE follows Taylor’s assumption (Taylor, 1954; Fischer et al., 1979) which can be applied in the Taylor period. However, most open channel flow has long initial period which makes the skewed concentration distribution due to the unbalance between the shear flow advection and the vertical mixing (Chatwin, 1970). Therefore, the non-Fickian dispersion model is necessary to compensate the limitations of the 2D ADE model. In this research, the two-dimensional particle dispersion model (2D PDM) was developed to analyze the pollutant mixing both in the initial and the Taylor period without determination of the dispersion coefficient. In the 2D PDM, pollutant particles were introduced to visualize physical mixing process according to the complicate flow variation in open channels. The 2D PDM is based on the shear flow dispersion theory and adopted the operator split method which divides the shear advection stage and the turbulent diffusion stage. In the shear advection stage, particles were separated by the vertical velocity deviations in the longitudinal and transverse directions. The separated particles according to the shear flow were mixed across the vertical in the turbulent diffusion stage. After the particle mixing, the particle distribution in each time step was converted to the concentration field for various analysis. The 2D PDM was applied to the straight channel and the meandering channel for analysis of the conservative pollutant mixing. In the straight channel, concentration curves from the 2D PDM showed skewed distribution in the initial period and then turned into the Gaussian distribution in the Taylor period. And, the concentration distributions in the meandering channel showed good agreement with the tracer test results.
Comments
Session R25, Eco-Hydraulic Modeling: Water Quality Aspects