Solving the World’s Toughest CFD Problems

Dams and Spillways

FLOW-3D HYDRO dams and spillways

Dams & Spillways

Hydroelectric power projects are sensitive to three-dimensional flow effects, and accurately predicting flow patterns is important for maximizing efficiency. FLOW-3D HYDRO is an industry leader in free-surface flow modeling and is used by dam professionals to address a wide range of design problems for existing and proposed projects. With state-of-art free surface flow modeling, exceptional accuracy and ease of use, and seamless integration of our solution into high performance computing platforms, dams and spillways are ideally suited for the natural modeling strengths of FLOW-3D HYDRO. From the simplest ogee to the most complex geometric configurations, every element of the dam and its surrounding infrastructure are ideal candidates for FLOW-3D HYDRO modeling. Common challenges that FLOW-3D HYDRO addresses include improving flow efficiency and distribution at intakes and spillways, performing complex environmental impact assessments of dams, and designing and optimizing fish passages.

Dams & Spillways Playlist

10 Videos
Description
Description

With the increased availability of high performance computing platforms, large scale simulation of complex free surface flows can now include very high meshing density, which delivers for the user a very high accuracy representation of the flow. This labyrinth weir model includes the free surface flow, as well as an estimate of air entrainment.

Dams & Spillways Focused Applications

Hydraulic controls

Intake hydraulics

Tailings

Tailrace analysis

Spillway analysis

Dam breach

Fishways

Stilling basins

Case Studies

Siphon spillway case study

Siphon Spillways

Model spillway roughness element

Mitigating Total Dissolved Gas at Boundary Dam

Spillway hydraulics assessment

Spillway Hydraulics Assessments

Free surface heights

Validation of a 3D Dam Breaking Problem

3d modeling of landslide induced wave hazard

Landslide-Induced Wave Hazard

Cfd simulation water velocities cofferdam

CFD + Physical Modeling Results

FLOW-3D is one of the most powerful tools available to analyze complex free surface and confined flow problems out there today. It provides an easy-to-use modeling interface and has been an integral tool in the design of hydroelectric, environmental, water resource and treatment related projects I’ve worked on over the last 15+ years. Flow Science’s technical support team and developers are easy to work with and are eager to provide advice, hear input from its users on potential enhancements to the code as well as quickly resolving issues that arise. The entire team at Flow Science have been great to work with and are a great resource to all engineers.
Justin BartelsSenior Hydraulic Engineer, Stantec
I have used FLOW-3D for over 15 years solving fluid flow problems in research and industrial applications. We use the software extensively in the design of river and coastal structures, water treatment units, dams, spillways, deep tunnels, and CSO diversion structures. FLOW-3D integrates state of the art in numerical solver techniques, cloud computing, pre- and post-processing tools resulting in substantial time and cost savings to our clients. FLOW-3D sales and technical support teams are excellent!
Yovanni Cataño-LoperaPrincipal Hydraulics Engineer, Dewberry
FLOW-3D is a sophisticated tool that provides insight into complex hydraulic problems that would be difficult to visualize or quantify with other software. Despite the sophistication, the software is very user friendly, and Flow Science provide great documentation and technical support. The results we have obtained from our FLOW-3D models have impressed both our clients and non-modelers in-house.
Michael HrossKleinschmidt
From using CFD analysis with FLOW-3D for over twenty years, our level of trust has increased to the point that we are now confident in using CFD modeling for general study purposes and final design applications. The software gives us flexibility to quickly change conceptual details and configurations allowing the design to advance in stages.
Efrem TeklemariamManitoba Hydro
FLOW-3D is a powerful tool with many applications. We used FLOW-3D to effectively resolve flow through and hydraulic forces on a water diversion structure. We also modeled water flow through a proposed fish passage. We have been impressed with the accuracy, computational speed, and especially the user friendly GUI. And, our clients have been impressed with the model output, as well as, animations created by the post-processer. We are also appreciative of the highly responsive support staff.
Christopher SiverdCoastal Engineer, Moffatt & Nichol
Over the years, FLOW-3D has helped us solve complex hydraulic problems that would have otherwise been very difficult to solve with conventional hydraulic modeling tools. We are very thankful to the team at FLOW-3D. They have constantly been making the software better over the years, and have been very responsive to our needs.
Benjamin Israel DevadasonSenior Hydrologic and Hydraulic Project Engineer, Gannett Fleming, Inc.
It is FLOW-3D‘s inherent simplicity that lends itself to use in real-world problem solving. Rather than spending large amounts of time pre-processing (i.e., setting problems up), users can spend their time applying the results of their work.
John RichardsonBlue Hill Hydraulics
At Golder, we thrive on challenges and we know we need to apply the best tools and technologies to confidently address those challenges head-on! This includes the CFD software we use to simulate complex fluid flows for environmental, mining, hydroelectric, and water resources applications. Using FLOW-3D CLOUD, we have consistently been able to better resolve the complex physics associated with our problems and achieved significant time savings for our projects.
W. Daley ClohanGlobal CFD Lead at Golder Associates Ltd.
FLOW-3D is a powerful tool for solving complex hydraulic issues related to planning, design and operation of our hydraulic system, as well as associated environmental studies. I am also impressed with Flow Science's customer support and product development.
Kevin SydorManitoba Hydro
It was really kind of fun. I learned more about where physical modeling was needed and when so, for certain instances, you actually can just do a pure CFD-based design. The physical model really wasn’t needed, but it gave the validation and reduced risk. It was incredible to get both those things done on a project.
Ryan EdisonAECOM
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