Continuous Monitoring of an Ice Sheet in a Reservoir Upstream of Beaumont Dam, Canada
Publication: Journal of Surveying Engineering
Volume 138, Issue 1
Abstract
The geomatics engineering contributions to continuous three-dimensional monitoring of ice sheet in a dam reservoir is presented in this paper. A total station robot was used to monitor the displacement of several probes placed on the surface of the ice sheet of a dam reservoir during winter seasons. Two prisms were mounted on each probe to take into account the deflection variation of the probe during a complete winter season. A similarity (Helmert) transformation was computed from measurements on control points to solve the problem of inconsistent observations. The results of the 2009 and 2010 winter campaigns at the Beaumont Dam are reported in this paper. We show that the horizontal displacements of the ice sheet, which can be as large as 20–30 cm, can vary quite differently from one winter season to another one, as a function of the temperature and its variation during winter. The horizontal displacements also depend on the probe's distance from the dam or from the reservoir banks. Vertical displacements of the ice sheet follow the reservoir water level fluctuations, especially for the probes far from the dam and reservoir banks. Three-dimensional displacements are explained by the gradual increase of the ice sheet’s thickness, the snowpack accumulation, and the local constraints (hinge effects) near the reservoir perimeter.
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Acknowledgments
This research is a part of a project undertaken by Laval University in partnership with the Institut de recherche d’Hydro-Québec (IREQ), the State University of New York (SUNY), the National Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC),NSERC and the participation of BMT Fleet Technology. This research is financially supported by the IREQ and the NSERCNSERC. The authors have greatly appreciated the support and cooperation of Edward Stander (SUNY), the staff members at IREQ (Alain Côté, André Tarras, Pierre Noël, Alex Gaudreau, and Roger Lupien) and at the Hydroelectrical Power Plant at Beaumont’s Dam during the field tests (Guy Grondin, Yves Bastarache, and Dany Carrier). They are also grateful to Éric Dubé and Martin Richard, from Laval University, for their help during the processing of robot data.
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Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Surveying Engineering
Volume 138 • Issue 1 • February 2012
Pages: 37 - 45
Copyright
© 2012 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Oct 22, 2010
Accepted: Jun 8, 2011
Published online: Jan 17, 2012
Published in print: Feb 1, 2012
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