CC BY
13УДК 004.942.001.57 doi:10.18720/SPBPU/2/id20-125
Васильев Константин Николаевич,
магистр, член Чартерного Института водного и экологического менеджмента, C.WEM, CSci, CEnv, старший консультант по рискам наводнений
К ПОНЯТИЮ ГИДРОИНФОРМАТИКИ
"Jacobs", Суиндон, Великобритания, kostyavasiliev@hotmail.com
Аннотация. На протяжении нескольких последних десятилетий на научном горизонте появляется область гидроинформатики. В кратком введении и обзоре на тему гидроинформатики, приведенных в статье, рассматривается, что представляет собой эта область науки, а также приводится авторское восприятие того, как эта область науки развивалась и как она связана с теорией систем.
Ключевые слова: гидроинформатика, гидравлическое моделирование, управление рисками наводнений, составление карт наводнений.
Konstantin N. Vasilyev, MSc, MCIWEM, C.WEM, CSci, CEnv, Senior Flood Risk Consultant
ON THE CONCEPT OF HYDROINFORMATICS
"Jacobs", Swindon, UK, kostyavasiliev@hotmail.com
Abstract. For several decades the domain of hydroinformatics has been emerging on the scientific arena. This quick introduction and overview of hydroinformatics looks at what this domain of science is, author's perception of how this domain of science has developed and how it links with systems theory.
Keywords: hydroinformatics, hydraulic modelling, flood risk management, flood mapping.
1. General Definition
When hearing the word "Hydroinformatics" it may be thought that it is just a combination of Computer Science and Water Management. However according to Professor Holz of Brandenburg University of Technology at Cottbus [1] Hydroinformatics is not just an application of Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) to water resources, Hydraulics or Hydrology. Social Science is strongly tied with water management studies under the umbrella of Hydroinformatics.
The Hydroinformatics community, part of International Water Association [2] considers that Hydroinformatics provides a symbiosis, and even a synergy, between ICT and water science and technologies with the objective of satisfying social requirements [2].
According to [2], the rationale and purpose of hydroinformatics is to develop a new relationship between the stakeholders and the users and suppliers of the systems: to offer the basis (systems) which supply useable results, the validity of which cannot be put in reasonable doubt by any of the stakeholders involved. Such a development of new relationship can be either on a very local level, or inter-state level, or even sub-continental. For example in the UK Catchment Flood Management Plans (CFMP) are being developed in compiling of which most often several local authorities participate [3]; Environment Agency is a leading UK government regulator for the environment regulating water issues among different areas as well [4]. There are also sub-continental regulatory documents such as European Union (EU) Water Framework Directive (WFD) [5], which provides legislative basis for protection of water in the EU.
It is interesting that according to the EU's portal web site EUROPA [6], 47% of citizens of the European Union (excluding Bulgaria and Romania) when asked to list the five main environmental issues mentioned "water pollution" (47%), with figures for individual countries going up as far as 71%. It is nearly half of all the population of the EU.
In hydroinformatics socio-economic and environmental part are combined together and are supported by mathematical calculations and physical modelling. The way socio-economic environment and natural environment intersect in the notion of hydroinformatics is illustrated in Figure 1.
The term Hydroinformatics was defined by M. Abbot as recently as 1991 [8, 9]. So, it can be said that Hydroinformatics is quite a new field of science which has just acquired its shape. However it is based on some fundamental research done in other fields of science earlier.
Why hydroinformatics appeared just fairly recently? Low public awareness of the importance of water in the world is one of the reasons, but also, as can be seen by the statements below, there was a lack of appropriate mechanisms and methods in the past that was holding the appearance of Hydroin-formatics as a science.
In the very beginning research in water engineering was based on empirical rules obtained from observations started with Old Romans and Greeks [1].
Modern hydraulics started in 19th century after formulation of Navier-Stokes (Three-dimensional (3D) flow in a water body) and St. Venant equations (One-dimensional (1D) channel flow). It was possible to extend understanding of water systems by physical experiments.
However for a century their application to the research in water engineering was limited [11, 12] due to the complexity of governing nonlinear partial differential equations (Navier - Stokes Equation and St. Venant Equation) which could not be solved analytically.
Fig. 1. Hydroinformatics is at the intersection of both socio-economic and natural
environments [1]
With the invention of the finite difference methods [13] and the computer, "an engine for the solution of large sets of linear equations" [12], it became possible to solve linear equations generated by finite difference methods and also support statistical analysis of data from the field. This was a start of the era of numerical models, the work on which was promoted through organizations such as International Association for Hydraulic Engineering and Research (IAHR). There is a Joint Committee on Hydroinformatics, formed under the auspices of the three parent organisations, IAHR, the International Water Association (IWA) and the International Association of Hydrological Sciences (IAHS). Changes of the name of the committee reflect an interesting trend:
1. Committee on the Use of Computers in Hydraulics, which was promoting support of calculations and measurements by computers.
2. Committee on Computational Hydraulics, which was promoting modelling of physics by computational models
3. Committee on Hydroinformatics, which has been was promoting modelling of physics by computational models and also included modelling of working processes and knowledge management [1].
Later the expansion of hydroinformatics towards modelling business processes and knowledge management has been supported by appearance of the internet and the object-oriented paradigm.
Recently the web-based hydroinformatics projects have been used for educational purposes: the following projects should be noted the WaterEu-rope programme [7] and HydroWeb [14].
In the end of XXth century in Germany some research towards application of knowledge management in hydroinformatics and some practical realizations have been achieved by K.-P.Holz and B.M. Bruggemann [16, 15]
The work on application of object-oriented approach to hydroinformatics started in the beginning of 1990s [10]. The following papers should be noted: The paper of V. Kutija [17] and M. Murray's PhD thesis [10]. In [17] V.Kutija describes the development of an object-oriented model for the solution of free surface flows in channel networks and M. Murray in [10] uses water supply model WatSupModel and a 1D finite difference model NOAH (Newcastle Object-oriented Advanced Hydroinformatics) 1D to demonstrate various object-oriented principles.
In the XXI century we start to see emergence of phone apps that can alert citizens of current flood warnings (such as Flood Alert by Jacobs in England that uses the open data feed on warnings by the Environment Agency in England) or utilisation of augmented reality concept for visualising flood risk [18]. So Hydroinformatics keeps up with progress in ICT.
2. Examples of a System in Hydroinformatics
In order to better understand what hydroinformatics is, it is interesting to look into hydroinformatics as a science from the perspective of the theory of systems. It is known that every science deals with systems [19]. According to the definition of a system given by the founder of the theory of systems Karl Ludwig von Bertalanffy: [20] a system is ''a combination of elements that are in a certain relationship between each other and the environment".
In Table 1 one can see the examples of the systems that are subject for research and consideration for hydroinformatics.
This table shows that hydroinformatics concentrates on such entities as rivers, catchments, coastal zones, water supply networks etc. And it has the specialized hydroinformatics tools to assist in calculations and modelling for each of these areas.
Table 1
Examples of systems, which are subject of research in Hydroinformatics [1]
Definition Example of calculations
River Calculation of discharge, stationary and time dependant flood events, transport of waste
Forecast of high water
Sedimentation and morphological evolution
Catchments Precipitation and evaporation, runoff
Runoff
Rainfall-discharge, hydrographs
Coastal zone Estuarine processes, storm surge, tsunamis
Water supply networks Water supply to the houses, water pressure
Conclusion
Hydroinformatics is quite a wide concept. It is still a young field of science, though there are a lot of computer and web-based systems that have been developed whose aim is to tackle the challenges considered by hydroinformatics. These software systems are Flood Modeller by Jacobs, US Army Corps' HEC RAS in the US, MIKE Suite of systems from DHA.
It has to be noted that the projects that these software systems look at vary from catchment management plans to local studies, such as a study of the impact of the weir on flood risk to a settlement nearby.
Therefore the application of these systems and the concept overall is wide, hence it is more important to develop specialists who would be hydroin-formatics experts, albeit not ICT experts or hydraulics professionals. I am also hinting towards building up on the success of the educational programmes such as [7] and [14].
References
1. Holz, K.-P. Overview of Hydroinformatics and Water Management: Lecture for EU-ROAQUAE students, Brandenburg University of Technology at Cottbus. 2006.
2. Web-site of Hydroinformatics Specialist Group. Accessed 01 July 2020 from https://iwa-network.org/groups/hydroinformatics-joint-iwaiahriahs.
3. Web-site of Environment Agency. Accessed 01 July 2020 from https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/environment-agency.
4. Burke, S. Introducing the Environment Agency: Presentation for EUROAQUAE students, University of Newcastle upon Tyne. 2006.
5. Web-site of European Union's portal EUROPA (Water Framework section). Accessed 01 July 2020 from http://ec.europa.eu/environment/water/water-framework/index_en.html.
6. Web-site of European Union's portal EUROPA. Accessed 01 July 2020 from http://europa.eu.
7. Web-site of Water Europe educational programme. from http://watereurope.aquacloud.net.
8. Abbott, M. B., Havn0, K., Lindber, S. The Fourth Generation of Numerical Modelling in Hydraulics. Journal of Hydraulic Research, 29(5), pp. 581-600, 1991. In Murray, M. An Investigation into Object-Oriented Approaches for Hydroinformatics Tools. PhD Thesis, University of Newcastle upon Tyne: 14. 2003.
9. Abbott, M. B and Minns,A. Computational Hydraulics Second Edition, Ashgate: Alder-shot: 577, 1998. In Murray, M. An Investigation into Object-Oriented Approaches for Hydroinformatics Tools. PhD Thesis, University of Newcastle upon Tyne:14. 2003.
10. Murray, M. An Investigation into Object-Oriented Approaches for Hydroinformatics Tools. PhD Thesis, University of Newcastle upon Tyne. 2003.
11. Chow, V. T. Open Channel Hydraulics. New York: McGraw-Hill. 1959.
12. Evans, E.P., Wicks, J.M., Whitlow, C.D., Ramsbottom D.M. The evolution of a river modelling system. Water Management, 160(3), pp. 3-13. 2007.
13. Richtmeyer, R. D. and Morton, K. W. Difference Methods for Initial-value problems. New York: Interscience. 1967. In Evans, E.P., Wicks, J.M., Whitlow, C.D., Ramsbottom, D.M. The evolution of a river modelling system. Water Management, 160(3), pp. 3-13, 2007.
14. Molkenthin, F. Web-based Collaborative Engineering based on Information Sharing. Proceedings of 10th ICCCBE conference. Weimar. In Web-site of Institute fur Bauinformatik in Brandenburg University of Technology at Cottbus. 2004 Accessed Accessed 01 July 2020 from http://www.bauinf.tu-cottbus.de.
15. Web-site of Institute fur Bauinformatik in Brandenburg University of Technology at Cottbus. Accessed 01 July 2020 http://www.bauinf.tu-cottbus.de.
16. Brüggemann, B.M., Holz, K.P. Integration of Hydroinformatics Tools in Dynamic Interactive Documents 4th International Conference on Hydroinformatics. Iowa City, IA, USA. 2000.
17. Kutija, V. Use of Object-oriented Programming in Modelling of Flow in Open Channel Networks. Proceedings of 3rd International Conference on Hydroinformatics, Copenhagen.
1998. In Murray, M., An Investigation into Object-Oriented Approaches for Hydroinformatics Tools. PhD Thesis, University of Newcastle upon Tyne: 21, 2003.
18. Haynes, P, Lange, E. Hehl-Lange, S. Augmented Reality for Flood Visualisation. Accessed 01 July 2020 from https://www.iwra.org/member/congress/resource/3024624.pdf.
19. Volkova, V.N, Denisov, A.A. Osnovy teorii sistem i sistemnogo analiza [Basics of theory of systems and systems anaylisis], St. Petersburg: SpbGTU publishing house.
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20. Bertalanffy, L. von. Obshchaya teoriya sistem: kriticheskij obzor/Issledovaniya po obshchej teorii sistem [General system theory: critical review/ research on general system theory]. Moscow: Progress: pp. 23-82. 1969 In Volkova, V.N, Denisov, A.A. Osnovy teorii sistem i sistemnogo analiza [Basics of theory of systems and systems anaylisis]. St. Petersburg: SpbGTU publishing house. 1999.
