Evaluating the Efficacy of Actively Managed Distributed Storage Systems for Peak Flow Reduction Using Spatially Uniform Design Storms

Extreme rainfall in midwestern United States has gotten more common over the last half century, thus increasing flooding events across the region. As a result, traditional flood mitigation measures are commonly overwhelmed by highwater events, illustrating the need for new solutions. Of the 91,000 dams in the US, the vast majority are small and go unused for flood mitigation. Among those that are utilized in flood peak reduction, few are actively managed in which outflows are manipulated through a gated outlet. Instead, small storage locations typically use passive control, allowing impounded water levels to fluctuate without the use of a gated outlet, possibly squandering some of their flow-reduction potential. In this paper, we have evaluated actively managed storage within a distributed network of 130 small dams in a 660-km2 watershed in southeastern Iowa using three operation schemes to increase storage utilization and reduce downstream flows. We developed a module to simulate the dam operation into a distributed hydrologic model that is forced with soil conservation service (SCS) 24-h design storms distributed uniformly across the watershed with 0.2, 0.1, 0.02, and 0.01 exceedance probabilities to evaluate flow reductions. When compared with passive operation, outlet flows were reduced under each proposed iteration of the 24-h design storm. Using the most aggressive operation scheme, outlet flows were reduced by over 70%. These results showcase the need for better understanding of activated flood storage across midwestern watersheds and encourage further work in optimizing this technique for real-time management.