Abstract
New current energy converter (CEC) deployment sites can be extremely difficult to characterize and costly based on location. Determining the data necessary to accurately model an area can minimize the need for multiple site investigations. As water levels change with seasonal variation, bathymetry data alone can’t always accurately depict flooding around the region. Depending on the nature of flooding it can dramatically impact the fluid dynamics. Alaska is home to over 200 remote communities with some of the highest energy costs in the United States. The Tanana River Test Site (TRTS) was established over 10 years ago as a location to deploy CECs that were representative of the challenges of remote Alaska without being as remote. These challenges include varying water levels, debris, high concentrations of sediment, etc. The TRTS is mainly used for short-term full-scale CEC deployments and is continuously monitored by the USGS for flow conditions. Throughout the past decade, several detailed acoustic bathymetry surveys and topographic drone images have been collected. This bathymetry was combined with the topography to create a topobathymetic data set. This topobathymetry was input into a Delft3D model with the accompanying water level and discharge at the inlet and outlet, the results model the river velocity, shear stress, turbulent intensity, and other variables not focused on in this study. The code for the results will be available in the MHKiT examples folder on GitHub. This presentation details the data and factors taken into consideration when creating the Delft3D model and discusses the validity by comparing the model to field measurements. SNL is managed and operated by NTESS under DOE NNSA contract DE-NA0003525.