Life Stage-Specific Hydropeaking Flow Rules

Abstract

Peak-operating hydropower plants are usually the energy grid's backbone by providing flexible energy production. At the same time, hydropeaking operations are considered one of the most adverse impacts on rivers, whereby aquatic organisms and their life-history stages can be affected in many ways. Therefore, we propose specific seasonal regulations to protect ecologically sensitive life cycle stages. By reviewing hydropeaking literature, we establish a framework for hydrological mitigation based on life-history stages of salmonid fish and their relationship with key parameters of the hydrograph. During migration and spawning, flows should be kept relatively stable, and a flow cap should be implemented to prevent the dewatering of spawning grounds during intragravel life stages. While eggs may be comparably tolerant to dewatering, post-hatch stages are very vulnerable, which calls for minimizing or eliminating the duration of drawdown situations and providing adequate minimum flows. Especially emerging fry are extremely sensitive to flow fluctuations. As fish then grow in size, they become less vulnerable. Therefore, an 'emergence window', where stringent thresholds on ramping rates are enforced, is proposed. Furthermore, time of day, morphology, and temperature changes must be considered as they may interact with hydropeaking. We conclude that the presented mitigation framework can aid the environmental enhancement of hydropeaking rivers while maintaining flexible energy production.2 of 17 impacts on rivers downstream of dams" [3]. Fish communities, in particular, are severely threatened by hydropeaking [4]. Fish can be affected by changes in various components of the hydrograph, whereby the most common responses-stranding, drift, and dewatering of spawning grounds-are mostly related to up-and downramping rates [5,6], peak flow magnitude [5], and baseflow duration [7].Considering the large capacity of existing storage hydropower plants [8], as well as new ones that are currently being planned and installed [9], it is imperative to develop appropriate and transferable management measures to mitigate these ecological impacts. Many structural (e.g., constructing retention basins) and operational (e.g., reducing flow fluctuation rates) mitigation measures have been proposed [10,11], but implementation remains difficult, among other issues, because of significant reductions in the energy yield when setting ecological thresholds [2,12]. Therefore, well-targeted mitigation measures have to be developed to avoid energy losses and to guarantee ecological efficiency.Freeman et al. [13] argue that adverse effects can be minimized by either restoring vital features of the natural flow regime or by implementing a flow management scheme which avoids hydropower-induced habitat bottlenecks. Regarding the latter, multiple studies point out the need to identify critical flows, which include seasonal and diel considerations when determining operational mitigation strategies in rivers affected by hydropeaking [5,[13][14][15][16]. To...

Cover or Velocity: What Triggers Iberian Barbel (Luciobarbus Bocagei) Refuge Selection under Experimental Hydropeaking Conditions?

“…In rivers affected by hydropeaking, hydromorphological characteristics may be significantly altered, including, e.g., substrate composition, banks wetted width and habitat suitability [3][4][5], with negative consequences for fish species, such as, e.g., stranding, dewatering of spawning grounds, and downstream displacement [6][7][8][9]. Those impacts are site-specific and, therefore, mitigation measures should be adapted considering the river morphology together with species-specific ecological requirements [6] such as life-stage [10]. Hydropeaking mitigation measures can be grouped into direct and indirect measures [11].…”

Habitat Enhancement Solutions for Iberian Cyprinids Affected by Hydropeaking: Insights from Flume Research

“…In addition, it is necessary to further the investigation to specific life-cycle stages, namely larvae and juvenile survival, foraging, reproductive migrations, or spawning. Specific aspects of the life-cycle of salmonids have been recently proposed to be included during the development of mitigation solutions for salmonids affected by hydropeaking [81]. However, such guidelines are inexistent for cyprinids.…”

Effects of hydropeaking on the attached eggs of a rheophilic cyprinid species

“…In addition to this indirect effect on fish fauna, hydropeaking was found to influence fish ecology directly, impacting the vulnerable stages in fish early life history, such as egg development in spawning sites or freshly hatched larvae (Hayes et al, 2019). One issue can be the dewatering of the spawning grounds (redds) when the river is off peak, which can cause high mortality of the eggs (Grabowski & Isely, 2007; McMichael, Rakowski, James, & Lukas, 2005).…”