Towards smarter stormwater management: Challenges, opportunities and insights from a UK case study

Abstract

Stormwater management is facing growing challenges, from climate change and environmental concerns to ageing infrastructure and urbanisation. Whilst hydraulic modelling and optimisation-based approaches have been used in water system planning and management for decades, the potential of ‘smart’ catchments and data-centric approaches is becoming increasingly recognised. This paper presents the ‘Blue Heart’ case study, in which a catchment subject to complex flood management challenges and where there was historically a poor understanding of interactions between water from different sources has been transformed via a dense network of sensors to provide enhanced knowledge and facilitate smarter stormwater management. The process has been based on the iterative transition framework presented by Sweetapple et al. (2023), and key challenges and lessons learned are presented here. An example application of the collected data in which locations where rising fluvial water levels that are not rainfall-driven and may not be flagged in traditional model-based approaches are identified is also presented as an example of new insights obtainable.