open TELEMAC-MASCARET The mathematically superior suite of solvers

We are looking to model a thermal plume and concentration of dissolved chemical species in the river/estuary adjacent to a UK power station when there is a cooling water blowdown.

We could use commercial CFD but feel that that could be hideously expensive in run times. We are looking for less computer-intensive solutions. We wonder if something like Telemac-3d could be more appropriate software - but have no feeling as to its capabilities.

We are interested in discharges to a estuarine river which is 1.5km long, 100-300m wide, and 7-10m deep.

How long would it take to set up and run such a model in Telemac-3D? Are we talking hours, days, weeks or months? Only need a quick answer as I am starting to find out about the topic.

Hello,

For a thermal plume or dissolved chemical species in an estuarine environment we consider that it is always a matter of months, to get the data, set up the mesh and the model, deal with the problem of open boundaries at the offshore boundary. For example, the accurate calibration of a model in an estuary sometimes requires that the friction coefficient depends on time, to take into account modifications of the bottom roughness due to the tide and the ripples formation.
As for Telemac-3D, it has been intensively used for such studies, e.g. in the Gironde Estuary, Loire Estuary, and many others in the UK, Germany, etc., for what I know. For thermal plumes and salinity or any dissolved matter that modifies the density, we find that only non hydrostatic Navier-Stokes equations can give the correct concentration. This is clearly shown by our test case called "lock exchange", which we also tried with other software.
Thanks to domain decomposition, the computation time can be highly reduced with a parallel computer.

With best regards,

Jean-Michel Hervouet

This is really useful to know Jean-Michel. Our prospect seems to want information in days - but the analysis will take weeks. We need to work on a plan b)