Real-Time Coastal Reservoir Control: Challenges and Opportunities for Computational Scientists

Description

This webinar was organised by the IWA Sustainable Coastal and Estuarine Development Specialist Group.

The construction of urban water reservoirs is one of the most sustainable strategies for meeting the growing drinking water demand in metropolitan coastal areas. However, maintaining water quality in these reservoirs remains a significant challenge. Large, physically based models can help characterise key water quality dynamics and simulate the effects of different remediation strategies. Nevertheless, their high computational demands limit their applicability for optimisation-based decision-making and, in particular, real-time operations. This webinar provided an overview of the computational approaches currently available to water managers, along with emerging research opportunities. Real-world examples from Singapore—where a network of coastal reservoirs supplies about a third of the city’s total water consumption— illustrated these concepts.