Setting Up of an Experimental Site for the Continuous Monitoring of Water Discharge, Suspended Sediment Transport and Groundwater Levels in a Mediterranean Basin. Results of One Year of Activity

Abstract

The study of suspended sediment transport requires continuous measurement of water discharge to better understand the sediment dynamics. Furthermore, a groundwater monitoring network can support the stream discharge measures, as it reveals how the interactions between surface water and groundwater may affect runoff and consequently sediment transport during flood events. An experimental site for the continuous monitoring of water discharge, suspended sediment transport and groundwater levels was set up in the Carapellotto basin (27.17 km2), which is located in Apulia, Southern Italy. Seven flood events that occurred in the operation timespan were covered with a full record of both water discharge and sediment concentration. Some monitoring problems, largely due to the clogging of the float by mud, suggested to improve the experimental set up. The results show high values of suspended sediments concentration which indicate the sub-basin’s key role in the sediment delivery to the whole river system, while counter-clockwise hysteresis loops are the most frequent due to the basin characteristics. The effects of the interaction between surface water and groundwater are related not only to the flood magnitude but also to the hydrogeological features in the hyporheic zone.

Suspended sediment in lowland rivers – towards identifying the ratios of mineral and organic components and their variation during the year

“…Analysis of SSC data often focuses on the variation in SSC in relation to changes in discharge. It is widely recognised that SSC correlates positively with discharge during isolated hydrological events, such as floods, resulting in a variety of hysteresis loops (Williams, 1989;Pagano et al, 2020). Previous studies on the River Warta, based on data taken between 1960 and 1980 (Skolasińska & Nowak, 2018;Skolasińska et al, 2020) did not find any clear relationship between discharge and suspension concentration.…”

Assessing the Optimal Stage-Cam Target for Continuous Water Level Monitoring in Ephemeral Streams: Experimental Evidence

“…[13] the duration of active streamflow and dry periods has been measured at 182 sites in the Attert catchment, Luxembourg, through time-lapse imagery, electric conductivity and stage measurements. The introduction of cameras for IRES monitoring has proved beneficial in such challenging environments since they have the potential to afford fully non-intrusive measurements at high spatio-temporal resolutions [14,15]. These capabilities are expected to open novel avenues for assessing and managing climate-related hazards [16,17].…”

Comment on hess-2021-36

“…Cameras have the potential to afford remote and continuous observations of relatively extended areas without affecting the flow field. Therefore, optic systems are increasingly being installed in existing monitoring stations to complement information gathered with and to assess the performance of traditional equipment (Pagano et al, 2020;Vetra-Carvalho et al, 2020). Portable and permanent implementations of image-based systems have demonstrated the suitability of photogrammetric approaches to characterize the surface flow velocity field and monitor floods in natural streams (Tauro et al, 2014;Perks et al, 2016;Tauro et al, 2016a,b;Pearce et al, 2020).…”