Category: Water Resources

Understanding Highway Hydraulics Keeps Bridges, People Safe

By Pete Haug, PE One of the principles of engineering is that water always wins. Whether contained in a river or falling in a rainstorm, water finds a way to infiltrate basements, saturate soils – and undermine bridges. The most common cause of bridge failures is from floods scouring bed material surrounding bridge foundations. What… Read More »

CFD Hydraulic Modeling Helps Find Solutions to Dam Flow Problems

By Pete Haug, PE Today’s engineering challenges are complex, especially for dam owners and operators. Flow problems around dams include spillway scour, riprap damaging currents, river debris collecting in the wrong places, and uneven overtopping of training walls. Imbalanced flow entering powerhouse units can create trash rack vibrations, excessive bearing wear, and even air-core vortex… Read More »

BIM Delivers Dividends on Unusual Structure Upgrades

By Pete Haug, PE Building information modeling (BIM) can play a big role in keeping the wheels from coming off an intricate project. We’ll look at a case study of a turbine and powerhouse upgrade project where the goal was to minimize changes to the exterior of a historic 1910 dam. But first, here are… Read More »