CAE and its partners bring the river Piave under control

CAE leads the group which won the tender for the project of “Environmental Regeneration of the terminal section of Piave river” managed by the Basin Authority of the Eastern Alps District. The project scope is to determine the real discharge capacity of the river and obtain the necessary information to develop a work plan. To this end, hydrometric level and discahrge measuring stations will be installed and their working will be supplemented by manual measuring campaigns.

Environmental regeneration of the end part of the river Piave – between Piave bridge and the river mouth – by means of monitoring of the flow rate. This is the call for tenders opened by the District Authority of the Eastern Alps in synergy with the Veneto region, and won by CAE, which leads a temporary business group, in Joint Venture with Survey Pilot and MMI. The contract will last 48 months.

A team of sector leaders with decades of experience come together here to form a unit able to bring to this essential mitigation project competence and quality for the safety of local population and the protection of the eco-system.

During the Vaia storm last year the Piave barely managed to sustain a flood of 2,500 cubic metres per second.

It was necessary to adopt a complete hydrogeological system plan, able first of all to measure river discharge, with the aim of widening them, and then to build a rolling basin to be activated before the watercourse reaches the plain. Climate change poses challenges which can be overcome as long as adequate prevention, maintenance and regeneration plans are in place, helped by the use of state of the art technological systems.

The hydrogeological monitoring activities, object of the public tender in this first phase, include supply and installation of a network consisting of one control centre and four monitoring stations equipped with Mhaster datalogger:

• 2 hydrometric stations with radar level sensor, which will be located near the hydraulic tollgate at Cortellazzo (Jesolo,VE) and at the Granatieri di Sardegna’s bridge, in the district of San Donà di Piave (VE);
• 1 station for water surface speed measurement with fixed horizontal ADCP and hydrometric pressure level sensor, for discharge rate estimation, placed at the bridge which connects Eraclea (VE) and Jesolo (VE);
• 1 discharge monitoring station with two radar level sensors, one to measure surface speed and one hydrometric levels. The station will be placed near the bridge which connects the districts of Ponte di Piave (TV) and San Biagio di Callalta (TV).

Moreover, maintenance and training will be provided to the contracting entity through specialized courses on hydrometric and hydrogeological measurement techniques.

Services planned include:

• 20 measurement campaigns for rating curve calibration scale and for river discharge calculation model in the existing four stations;
• 36 programmed river discharge measurement campaigns with ADCP sensor;
• 10 on-call river discharge measurement campaigns with ADCP sensor.

Planned among the other tasks is the verification of river bed’s floor morphology and rating curve at the four fixed stations. Moreover, at stations located near the sea, as well as speed of the current, its direction will also be measured where deviations occur due to salt-water intrusion effect.

Back to the news index