HEC-RAS
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
HEC-RAS is a computer program that models the hydraulics of water flow through natural rivers and other channels. The program is one-dimensional, meaning that flow is considered to move uniformly from point to point upstream to downstream. Development of the program was funded by the US Department of Defense, Army Corps of Engineers in order to manage the rivers, harbors, and other public works under their jurisdiction; it has found wide acceptance by many others since its public release in 1995.
The Hydrologic Engineering Center (HEC) in California developed the River Analysis System (RAS) to aid hydraulic engineers in channel flow analysis and floodplain determination. It includes numerous data entry capabilities, hydraulic analysis components, data storage and management capabilities, and graphing and reporting capabilities.
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[edit] How it works
The basic computational procedure of HEC-RAS for steady flow is based on the solution of the one-dimensional energy equation. Energy losses are evaluated by friction and contraction / expansion. The momentum equation may be used in situations where the water surface profile is rapidly varied. These situations include hydraulic jumps, hydraulics of bridges, and evaluating profiles at river confluences.
For unsteady flow, HEC-RAS solves the full, dynamic, Saint-Venant equation using an implicit, finite method. The unsteady flow equation solver was adapted from Dr., Robert L. Barkau’s UNET package.
HEC-RAS is equipped to model a network of channels, a dendritic system or a single river reach. Certain simplifications must be made in order to model some complex flow situations using the HEC-RAS one-dimensional approach. It is capable of modeling subcritical, supercritical, and mixed flow regime flow aalong with the effects of bridges, culverts, weirs, and structures.
[edit] Use
HEC-RAS is a computer program for modeling water flowing through systems of open channels and computing water surface profiles. HEC-RAS finds particular commercial application in floodplain management and flood insurance studies to evaluate floodway encroachments. Some of the additional uses are: bridge and culvert design and analysis, levee studies, and channel modification studies. It can be used for dam breach analysis, though other modeling methods are presently more widely accepted for this purpose.
[edit] Advantages
HEC-RAS has merits, notably its support by the US Army Corps of Engineers, the future enhancements in progress, and its acceptance by many government agencies and private firms. It is in the public domain and peer-reviewed, and available to download free of charge from HEC's web site. Various private companies are registered as official "vendors" and offer consulting support and add on software. Some also distribute the software in countries that are not permitted to access US Army web sites. However, the download from HEC includes extensive documentation, and scientists and engineers versed in hydraulic analysis should have little difficulty applying the software.
[edit] HEC-RAS in AutoCAD
HEC-RAS can be used along with AutoCAD. A digital terrain model (DTM) can be constructed in AutoCAD and sections can be cut from the DTM and imported into HEC-RAS.
According to its vendor, a more sophisticated river modeling system is RiverCAD by BOSS International Inc. It supports the latest version of HEC-RAS and HEC-2 and is a standalone AutoCAD compatible application.
(needed: impartial review of this commercial product)
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[edit] Download
- HEC-RAS home page at the US Army Corps of Engineers, Hydrologic Engineering Center
HEC-RAS downloads available, for a fee, from BOSS, a value-added vendor:
