Flood Risk Assessment of the Proposed Nuclear Power- Plant in Bangladesh

Abstract

To satisfy the increasing energy demand, Bangladesh has started building a nuclear power-plant. Before building a power-plant, environmental impact assessment of the location is very crucial. In a country like Bangladesh, which has numerous big rivers, a flood risk assessment of the study area is essential for precautious measurements. The objective of this project is to conduct a flood risk assessment of the proposed nuclear power-plant which is located at the bank of River Ganges in Pabna district of Bangladesh. In this project, the hydrological assessment was done by using Gumbel Distribution- Extreme Value type I (EV1) to estimate the 100 years return period flood. Consequently, a hydraulic assessment was done by using the Hydrologic Engineering Center’s River Analysis System (HEC-RAS) modeling for estimating the area under risk during extreme flood. Required data was collected from the nearest hydrological station from the Water Development Board Bangladesh, and some other physical parameters were taken by interpolating data from Google maps. The output of the HEC-RAS model was used to show whether the proposed nuclear power-plant is within the risk zone. Further studies with reliable data, can improve the result into a more accurate model, and depending on the severity of the risk, necessary measures can be taken.