Exploration of Relationships between Flood Control Capacity and Peak Flow Reduction in a Multireservoir System Using an Optimization-Clustering-Fitting Framework

Abstract

Quantifying the relationship between reservoir flood capacity and peak flow reduction can identify reservoirs with good flood control effect and be important for reasonably allocating flood control capacity for larger peak flow reduction. In this study, an optimization-clustering-fitting framework consisting of the Dynamic Programming-Progressive Optimality Algorithm, K-means method, and multiple linear regression, is proposed and applied to a multireservoir system in the middle and lower reaches of the Ganjiang River, China. The results reveal the law of diminishing marginal benefit in reservoir flood control capacity, which means that as reservoir capacity increases, the peak flow reduction increase is larger in low water levels than that in high ones. In this multireservoir flood control system, the Wan’an reservoir has greater flood control potential and can reduce more peak flow of the downstream flood control points than the Xiajiang reservoir when the same capacity of both reservoirs is used for flood control.