Simulation-driven design with computational fluid dynamics has been used to evaluate the flow downstream of a hydropower plant with regards to upstream migrating fish. Field measurements with an Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler were performed, and the measurements were used to validate the simulations. The measurements indicate a more unstable flow than the simulations, and the tailrace jet from the turbines is stronger in the simulations. A fishway entrance was included in the simulations, and the subsequent attraction water was evaluated for two positions and two angles of the entrance at different turbine discharges. Results show that both positions are viable and that a position where the flow from the fishway does not have to compete with the flow from the power plant will generate superior attraction water. Simulations were also performed for further downstream where the flow from the turbines meets the old river bed which is the current fish passage for upstream migrating fish. A modification of the old river bed was made in the model as one scenario to generate better attraction water. This considerably increases the attraction water although it cannot compete with the flow from the tailrace tunnel.

Laser Doppler Velocimetry (LDV) measurements, flow visualizations and unsteady Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations have been carried out to study the turbulent wake that is formed behind a semi-circular step cylinder at a constant flow rate. The semi-circular cylinder has two diameters, a so-called step cylinder. The results from the LDV measurements indicate that wake length and vortex shedding frequency varies with the cylinder diameter. This implies that a step cylinder can be used to attract fish of different size. By visualizations of the formation of a recirculation region and the well-known von Kármán vortex street behind the cylinder are disclosed. The simulation results predict the wake length and shedding frequency well for the flow behind the large cylinder but fail to capture the dynamics of the flow near the step in diameter to some extent and the flow behind the small cylinder to a larger extent when compared with measurements.

The flow characteristics in the vicinity of a set of half-cylinders of different sizes simulating benthic objects were studied experimentally using particle image velocimetry (PIV). The cylinders were mounted on the bottom of an open channel, and the influence of the flow speed on the distribution of the shear stress along the bottom geometry was investigated. Of special interest was how the shear stress changes close to the wall as a function of the flow speed and cylinder arrangement. It was found that the shear stress varies significantly as a function of position. This implies habitat heterogeneity allowing benthic invertebrates with different shear stress tolerance exists when the bottom consists of differently sized stones. It was also shown that direct measurements of near wall velocity gradients are necessary to accurately calculate the wall shear stress for more complex geometries.

The operating conditions of Nordic hydropower plants are expected to change in the coming years to work more in conjunction with intermittent power production, causing more frequent hydropeaking events. Hydropeaking has been shown to be detrimental to wildlife in the river reaches downstream of hydropower plants. In this work, we investigate how different possible future hydropeaking scenarios affect the water surface elevation dynamics in a bypass reach in the Ume River in northern Sweden. The river dynamics has been modeled using the open-source solver Delft3D. The numerical model was validated and calibrated with water-surface-elevation measurements. A hysteresis effect on the water surface elevation, varying with the downstream distance from the spillways, was seen in both the simulated and the measured data. Increasing the hydropeaking rate is shown to dampen the variation in water surface elevation and wetted area in the most downstream parts of the reach, which could have positive effects on habitat and bed stability compared to slower rates in that region.

Shallow waterways such as rapids, tributaries and smaller streams can have important ecological functions in both free-flowing and regulated rivers. As more intermittent renewable energy is introduced to the energy system to reduce CO₂ emissions, the operational conditions of hydropower plants are changing. This implies various flow scenarios that can lead to more locations with shallow depths and larger variations in water levels and velocities, resulting in increased impact on the riverine ecosystem. Accurate predictions of these impacts require an understanding of the flow dynamics near large roughness elements such as boulders or trees in shallow river regions. This study uniquely investigates the effect of relative submergence, i.e., water depth relative to boulder size, on the flow field, turbulence, and potential fish habitats around idealized stone shapes (hemispheres) in shallow open channel flow using time-resolved 3D particle tracking velocimetry. The results indicate that varying relative submergence significantly affects recirculation zones, velocity and vorticity distribution, as well as turbulent kinetic energy. Notably, larger regions of lower velocity downstream of the roughness elements were generated at lower submergences, which might be favorable for fish energy conservation. Valuable insights into ecohydraulic engineering and habitat restoration in shallow waterways can be gained by understanding the fundamental flow mechanisms at low submergence for the flow around large roughness elements.

In numerical simulations of flow over rough surfaces, the roughness is often not resolved but represented by a numerical model. The validity of such an assumption is investigated in this paper by Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes simulations of flow over a surface with a large roughness. The surface was created from a high-resolution laser scanning of a real rock blasted tunnel. By reducing the geometrical resolution of the roughness in two steps, the importance of an appropriate surface description could be examined. The flow fields obtained were compared to a set-up with a geometrical flat surface where the roughness was represented by a modified form of the Launder and Spalding wall-function. The flow field over the surface with the lowest resolution was substantially different from those of the two finer resolutions and rather close to the results from the set-up with the wall-function. The results also yield that the finer the resolution is the more vorticity is formed close to the rough surface and more turbulence is generated.