Application of Goal Programming in Flood Flow Modeling

The study presents a pre-emptive goal programming model formulation for a river system incorporating flows from gauged and ungauged subbasins. Incorporation of flows from both gauged and ungauged subbasins simplifies the optimization model resulting in accurate estimation of the downstream water flow. To derive optimal regulation of a river system under flood condition, multiple objectives with flow variables are used which are ranked in order of priority, and optimized sequentially to obtain an optimal solution for the problem. The model is applied in the Barak River basin (India), with three gauged and five ungauged water flows affecting the downstream flows in the river system. Downstream control point flows are zoned with prioritized objectives used to derive an optimal flow rate for reducing flood damage in the river basin. Model applications in the Barak River Basin show that damage at downstream locations could be substantially reduced if the water inflows are predicted well in advance.