Optimal interventions for flood control,drainage and irrigation project improvements

ABSTRACT

A Mixed-Integer Nonlinear Programming (MINLP) model is formulated and solved in this study to optimize environmental sustainability of flood control, drainage, and irrigation (FCDI) projects in the deltaic regions of Bangladesh. The model optimizes the value of integrated resource benefit, a dimensionless variable defined to measure the environmental sustainability based on the water, agricultural and ecological resources, with a set of project interventions being the major drivers. The resource benefits were evaluated with the help of several indicators, such as flood, navigability, salinity, waterlogging, cropping intensity, land loss and vegetation. The solution of MINLP model provided optimal values of the decision variables, which are the quantities of project interventions (e.g. length and height of dike, number of sluices and drainage inlets, lengths of drainage canals, erosion protection and afforestation works). The approach and the MINLP formulation presented in this study can be used for any real-life FCDI project improvements.