Territory Flood Modeling in GIS

2021 IEEE Conference of Russian Young Researchers in Electrical and Electronic Engineering (ElConRus) | 978-1-6654-0476-1/20/$31.00 ©2021 IEEE | DOI: 10.1109/ElConRus51938.2021.9396143

Viktor. S. Kovchik Natalia. I. Kurakina Roman. A. Myshko

Department of Information Measuring Department of Information Measuring Department of Information Measuring
System and Technologies System and Technologies System and Technologies
Saint Petersburg Electrotechnical Saint Petersburg Electrotechnical Saint Petersburg Electrotechnical
University "LETI" University "LETI" University "LETI"
Saint-Petersburg, Russia Saint-Petersburg, Russia Saint-Petersburg, Russia
vkovchik@gmail.com NKurakina@gmail.com romanmyshko@gmail.com

Abstract— The issues of landscape modeling of hydrological and drinking source of the region - a typical example of a water
processes are studied in this paper. A generalized geoinformation body subject to annual intense floods. Knowledge of the
model of runoff formation has been developed. The flow is regularities of the course of the process of flooding in a given
schematized on the basis of the allocation within the basin of region is of wide practical importance.
homogeneous landscape-hydrological areas and altitudes. This
problem is solved by means of GIS technologies based on digital II. DIGITAL ELEVATION MODELS
elevation models, soil and landscape maps of various scales,
A digital elevation model is an essential component of any
satellite imagery data and processing products. The allocation of
zones of flooding given security is carried out using specialized hydrological model. The spatial resolution of the digital model
tools "Hydrology" ArcGIS Spatial Analyst. For analysis, only the of the territory used in digital modeling is determined by the
catchment area should be considered. This is the most area of the considered catchment and the detailing of the
significantly reducing time costs. The object of the study is the available data. For example, the ECOMAG (Ecological Model
Belaya River in the Republic of Bashkortostan, the main water for Applied Geophysics) model used for large catchments uses
and drinking source of the region - a typical example of a water the GLOBE (The Global Land One-km Base Elevation Project)
body subjected to intense annual spills. The analysis of the results DEM with a cell size of 1 km. Modeling runoff from small and
is carried out in accordance with real statistics of flooding in the medium-sized catchments requires data with higher spatial
studied region. resolution, which is somewhat difficult to obtain. Over the past
10 years, global DEMs with a grid spacing of 30 to 250 m have
Keywords—flooding; flow formation; modeling; watershed, become freely available: SRTM (Shuttle Radar Topography
GIS Mission), GMTED2010 (Global Multi-resolution Terrain
Elevation Data), ASTER GDEM (Advanced Spaceborne
I. INTRODUCTION
Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer, Global Digital
Flooding is a problem that annually affects thousands of Elevation Model).
settlements in Russia and around the world. Spring floods
cause significant material damage, affect houses, cars, roads, As a result of the analysis of various models, the
other infrastructure facilities and industrial facilities, impede GMTED2010 DEM was recognized as the most suitable for
movement and assistance to victims, not to mention the lives of solving the problem of flow formation due to its availability for
people annually taken away by flooding. In this regard, it is of use, acceptable accuracy and speed of work with the model.
practical importance to determine the areas of possible The model is in the public domain.
flooding, as well as to compile a list of objects that are in III. RIVER FLOW MODELING
immediate threat of flooding with different probability.
To determine the channel of the fluid flow, the DEM can be
The use of geoinformation technologies and digital represented as a surface of a fixed height composed of
elevation models (DEM) makes it possible to significantly horizontal cells. The liquid “flows out” from the cell and is
automate this process. Determination of possibly flooded areas distributed between those of its neighbors whose height is less
is currently a widespread applied hydrological problem solved than the central cell.
by GIS tools [1]. As the initial data for determining the
flooding zones, it is necessary to have detailed information A. Flow direction
about the relief and the values of water levels of a given ArcGIS Desktop implements the Deterministic Eight
supply. Neighbor (D8) flow direction algorithm. According to it, the
The purpose of this work is to study modern solutions in flow from the cell under consideration is entirely directed to
the issue of cartographic modeling of territory flooding, that of the eight neighboring cells, which has a lower height
development of an algorithm for identifying flooding zones of and the greatest slope of the line connecting the center of the
a given supply using specialized tools "Hydrology" ArcGIS current cell with the center of the neighboring one [2]. The
Spatial Analyst, analysis of the results in accordance with real output of the Flow Direction tool will be an integer raster
statistics of flooding in the analyzed region. whose values range from 1 to 255 depending on the flow
direction (Fig. 1).
The object of research in this work is the Belaya River, the
largest river in the Republic of Bashkortostan, the main water

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 32 64 128

16 1

8 4 2

Fig. 1. The values in the Flow Direction raster

Fig. 3. Flow Direction and Flow Accumulation
B. Local depressions
To ensure the correct operation of the D-8 algorithm, it is D. Stream network
necessary to first eliminate the so-called local depressions in Stream networks are extracted from the DEM using the
the DEM. output of the Flow Cumulative tool using a threshold value in
Local depressions are small errors caused by data resolution the Condition tool. The threshold value for the definition of
or elevation rounding to the nearest integer value. They must streams will corre-spond to the upstream of small rivers and
be filled in order to better identify basins and watercourses. If streams. The cells corresponding to the channels of large riv-
this is not done, the dedicated drainage network may be ers have the largest values of the total flow. To distinguish not
broken. only large, but also small rivers, and subsequently the
boundaries of catchments, it is necessary to establish a
This task is accomplished in ArcGIS Desktop using the Fill minimum threshold value of the total flow corresponding to
tool. The tool will be executed, repeating itself until all local watercourses. In our case, the minimum threshold value is set
depressions without exception are filled, taking into account to 2e + 003.
the specified Z (height) limitation [2]. In Fig. 2 shows a digital
elevation model after filling in local depressions. E. Steam Order
Stream order identifies and classifies streams based on the
number of their tributaries. Thus, flows of the first order have
priority over the flow of water on land; they do not have a
concentrated up-stream flow. This is the reason for their
susceptibility to non-point source pollution problems; they can
benefit more from wide coastal buffers than from other
watershed areas.
The Stream Order tool has two methods for assigning an
order [2]. These are the methods suggest-ed by Straler and
Shreve. Although the default Straler method is the most
common, the advantage of the Shreve method is that it is not as
sensitive to the addition and removal of links during further
analysis.
In these two methods, the upstream stream segments, or
external links, are always assigned order 1. The result of
Fig. 2. Digital Elevation Model distinguishing streams of different order is shown in Fig.4.

C. Flow accumulation
Based on the flow direction raster, a flow accumulation
raster is formed, where each cell is deter-mined by the sum of
the weights for all cells flowing into each cell located down the
slope [2].
Cells with undefined flow direction will accumulate flow;
they will not contribute downslope run-off. A cell is considered
to have an undefined flow direction if its value in the flow
direction raster is not equal to 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, or 128. The
total flow is based on the number of cells from which flow to
each specific cell in the output raster. The cell that is being
processed at the current time is not counted in the total. Outlet
cells with high total flow are areas of concentrated flow; they
are used to define the channels of streams. Zero-flow output
cells are local topographic peaks; they can be used to highlight
ridges or watershed lines. The algorithm of operation of the
"Flow accumulation" tool is shown in Fig. 3.
Fig. 4. Steam Order

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F. Watershed where Model is the values of the edge, H is the specified height
The watershed is the upslope area that distributes the flow of the water level rise, GMTED is the digital elevation model.
to a common outlet. The boundaries be-tween catchments are The result of the calculation will be a binary raster, where a
called flow demarcation lines. The watershed areas are single value corresponds to a flooded area, and a zero value
extracted from the DEM by calculating the flow direction and corresponds to a non-flooded area.
using it in the Catchment Area tool.
Then it is necessary to convert the resulting raster into a
For automatic selection of the watershed, it is necessary to vector representation of the data in order to use it for
set the points of the mouth, correspond-ing to the lines of the performing spatial operations: for example, calculating the
design drainage. It is recommended to set the wellhead points areas of underflooding, the length of flooded roads, the number
near the hydro-posts so that they are exactly on the axis of the of buildings that fall into the flooded zone, etc.
calculated flows.
V. ALGORITHM FOR IDENTIFYING FLOODED AREAS OF THE
To select points with a high total flow rate when selecting
BELAYA RIVER
watershed basins, use the Snap Pour Point tool. This tool
searches for the cells with the highest total flow within the The algorithm for defining the boundaries of flooded areas
tolerance range around the specified wellhead points and shifts using the ArcGIS and DEM tools is shown in Figure 6.
the wellhead point to that position. The resulting catchment
areas are shown in Figure 5.

Fig. 6. Algorithm for identifying flooded areas

At the beginning, using the Fill tool, local drops in the

DEM are eliminated, which prevent the correct operation of the
flow calculation algorithm. Then, the direction of flow in the
Fig. 5. Watershed given area is calculated and a raster of the total flow is built.
Guided by the scheme of hydrological posts, the mouth
G. Vectorizing a watershed raster
points are manually placed to separate the catchment of the
To calculate the watershed area, as well as various analyzed river from other catchments. Placed pour points in
morphometric parameters, it is necessary to con-vert its contour vector format are converted to raster format and linked to the
from a raster to a vector format. total flow raster.
IV. DETERMINATION OF FLOODIN G BOUNDARIES BASED ON With the help of the "Watershed" tool, the watershed area
DEM of the analyzed territory is selected. Then, the watershed is
converted to vector format and the drainage area of the Belaya
One of the methods for determining flooding zones in GIS
River is selected. On the basis of the catchment scheme and the
is the elevation method [3]. To identify the flooded area, an
DEM, a waterline model is created. The model is converted to
initial digital elevation model and a model of the secant plane
raster format.
of the water surface when the water level rises to a given height
are required. The cutting plane must also take into account the The calculation of flooding zones of different supply is
slope of the river, i.e. have a constant decline along its channel. carried out using the "Raster Calculator" according to the
As such a model, a raster is used that carries data on the water's formula (1). To determine the area of the flooded zone and
edge. By adding the value of the expected rise of the water identify settlements affected by flooding, the flooding zones
level to this raster using the Raster Calculator (the same are converted into a vector format.
throughout the calculation area) and subtracting the digital
elevation model, it is possible to determine the flood area (in VI. ANALYSIS AND EVALUATION OF RESULTS
which the calculation result will be greater than zero). Using the "Hydrology" tools of the ArcGIS Spatial Analyst,
To calculate the flooding zone during high water, you must the above algorithm was implemented, layers of flooding zones
enter the corresponding expression in the "Raster Calculator": were created during floods of varying availability and a
thematic map was built, shown in Fig. 7. In the work, flooding
(Model + H - GMTED) < 0, (1)

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was modeled during spring floods of 5%, 1% and 0.1% supply So, with flooding of 0.1% of the supply, most of the
[4]. Kirovsky district and the Demsky district will be subject to
flooding. The listed areas are also present in the report of the
Committee for Emergency Situations of Bashkiria at all values
of the water rise level.
The performed comparative analysis allows us to conclude
about the reliability of the modeling data and the possibility of
using the developed algorithm for hydrological modeling of
flood zones in different regions.
VII. CONCLUSION
The developed algorithm for modeling flooding zones
serves as an information basis for solving problems of
forecasting floods and emergency spills. A clear display of the
ecological situation on the map will allow to timely prevent
possible emergencies and effectively solve the problems of
eliminating the consequences of hazardous hydrological
phenomena.
REFERENCES
Fig. 7. Flooding zones of different availability
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processes and phenomena: monograph / S.V. Pyankov, A.N. Shikhov;
To assess the accuracy of the results obtained, they were Perm. state nat. issled. un-t. - Perm, 2017 .- 148 p., Ill.
compared with the data of flooding on the Belaya River in the [2] https://desktop.arcgis.com/en/arcmap/10.5/tools/spatial-analyst-
city of Ufa of the State Committee of the Republic of toolbox/an-overview-of-the-hydrology-tools.htm - ArcGISDesktop
Bashkortostan for Emergency Situations in 2017 [5]. Based on reference data.
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Polyana, Nizhegorodka microdistricts, significant areas of the hydrographic characteristics of rivers and their catchments using digital
Kirovsky and Demsky and Leninsky districts of the city of Ufa cartographic modeling: textbook. Allowance / Perm. state nat. issled. un-
t. - Perm, 2013 .- 71 p.
fall into the flooding zone for each supply value (Fig. 8).
[4] Myshko, R.A., Kurakina, N.I., Kovchik, V.S. Geoinformational
generalized flow formation model for solving problems of
prognostication and emergency prevention Proceedings of the 2019
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[5] https: //gkchs.bashkortostan.ru/activity/1788/ - State Committee of the
Republic of Bashkortostan for Emergency Situations, flood data for
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Fig. 8. Flooding zones in the city of Ufa

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