influence of a storm surge barrier’s operation on the flood frequency in the rhine delta area影响风暴潮屏障的操作在莱茵河三角洲洪水频率.pdfVIP

Water 2012, 4, 474-493; doi:10.3390/w4020474 OPEN ACCESS water ISSN 2073-4441 /journal/water Article Influence of a Storm Surge Barrier’s Operation on the Flood Frequency in the Rhine Delta Area Hua Zhong 1,*, Peter-Jules van Overloop 2, Pieter van Gelder 1 and Ties Rijcken 1 1 Department of Hydraulic Engineering, Faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Delft University of Technology, Stevinweg 1, Delft 2628 CN, The Netherlands; E-Mails: P.H.A.J.M.vanGelder@tudelft.nl (P.G.); T.Rijcken@tudelft.nl (T.R.) 2 Department of Water Management, Faculty of Civil Engineering and Geosciences, Delft University of Technology, Stevinweg 1, Delft 2628 CN, The Netherlands; E-Mail: P.J.A.T.M.vanOverloop@tudelft.nl * Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; E-Mail: Hua.Zhong@tudelft.nl; Tel.: +31-15-2789457; Fax: +31-15-2785124. Received: 9 April 2012; in revised form: 2 May 2012 / Accepted: 4 May 2012 / Published: 11 May 2012 Abstract: The Rhine River Delta is crucial to the Dutch economy. The Maeslant barrier was built in 1997 to protect the Rhine estuary, with the city and port of Rotterdam, from storm surges. This research takes a simple approach to quantify the influence of the Maeslant storm surge barrier on design water levels behind the barrier. The dikes in the area are supposed to be able to withstand these levels. Equal Level Curves approach is used to calculate the Rotterdam water levels by using Rhine discharges and sea water levels as input. Their joint probabilit