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Operational Integrated Modelling Has Arrived

The 1st OpenMI LIFE Scheldt workshop was successfully held in Antwerp on the 25th of November 2008. The event was expertly chaired by Professor Willy Bauwens of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel who introduced a number of presentations from the Scheldt basin participants in the OpenMI LIFE project. The workshop marked the end of the testing phases of the project, prior to moving on to the operational phase. The presentations described the progress made on each of the Scheldt use cases, which are testing the real world application of the OpenMI. The representatives of each use case confirmed that they are ready and able to put integrated modelling into practice in everyday water management operations.

Over 60 participants from a wide range of organisations and industries attended the workshop, including representatives of the project partners and members of the OpenMI Association and its committees. Roger Moore of CEH Wallingford, President of the OpenMI Association, opened the day's proceedings with an introduction to the OpenMI and the OpenMI LIFE project. The LIFE project aims to demonstrate the applicability of the OpenMI through use on a number of real-world examples in the Scheldt and Pinios basins. The project aims to identify the issues that arise when models are joined together, widely disseminate those issues, and promote further research to investigate and resolve those issues.

Each of the four main use cases was then presented. Johan Van Assel of Aquafin detailed the work on the first Scheldt use case which is linking existing InfoWorks CS (sewer) and InfoWorks RS (river) models to improve the overall representation of flood processes in Leuven. He highlighted a key feature of this particular study which is the number of points where the river and sewer systems interact through both level and flow, and in total there are almost 200 points of interaction that have been represented. Most of the testing time has been spent ensuring the model linkages at these points are stable and give a reasonable representation of the flows through physical connections.

Neel Devroede of VMM-AWA then presented the second use case, which is linking together two river models to improve the representation of flooding in the Dijle river downstream of Leuven. OpenMI provides the mechanism to link a MIKE-11 model of the downstream river with an InfoWorks RS model upstream. Mr. Devroede identified some issues arising from linking the models, including the need to recalibrate the upstream models as a result of improved downstream boundary conditions. Initially, stability had been a concern, but by allowing an overlap in the linkage between the models, the resulting simulations were certainly stable.

Following a brief and informative demonstration of the OpenMI in action by Jan Gregerson of the OpenMI Association Technical Committee, Yves Ronse of VMM and Pol Magelmans from University of Liege introduced the third use case. This case is looking to assess the benefits of improved flow estimates for water quality modelling through linking InfoWorks RS and MIKE-11 into the PEGASE catchment wide water quality model. By introducing flow calculations from the river models into PEGASE at locations where observed flows are not available, it is hoped to improve the calculation of water quality in those areas. Pol Magelmans showed some encouraging results from the linked models that clearly show how the PEGASE results are being conditioned by those from the other models. However, he also emphasised the need for caution as any existing limitations in the river models have the potential to be reflected in the combined model results.

Finally Isabelle Neyskens of Flanders Hydraulics rounded off the use case presentations by covering the work being done to model the Lower Scheldt using a combination of the DELTARES WAQUA 3D model and MIKE-11. This shows that OpenMI can be comfortably used to integrate models of different dimensions: in this case a one-dimensional river model with a three-dimensional coastal model.

Throughout the day there were a number of lively discussion sessions, which ranged across a wide set of issues. Participants were interested in the institutional aspects of the use cases, for example how the different organisations involved in the use cases were developing procedures to work together effectively. The technical issues of linking particular model types and locations were debated, with many useful ideas for preventing or eliminating some of the stability issues that have been seen on occasions when running linked models. The need for ensuring correct calibration of integrated models was discussed, and the need to ensure that individual models of an integrated model are fit for purpose. Were they developed for the range of conditions to which they are now being applied?

Professor Willy Bauwens brought the workshop to a close with a summary of his thoughts on integrated modelling. In particular he stressed that integrated modelling does not remove the need to fully understand the individual models but makes that need even greater. The professor is new to OpenMI, but he was encouraged by the successes demonstrated at the workshop and will certainly be introducing OpenMI into his own field of work in the future.

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