The time variation of sediment accumulation in dam lakes and its visualization with GİS

The debate on global water supply is a vital issue. Therefore, countries develop projects with the purpose of maintaining their own water potential and according to their ergonomic usage. Dams constitute the foremost among the developed projects. Sediments are formed in dry dams due to coastal erosion and deposition of materials carried by the streams that feed the reservoir. The base of the reservoir rises because of sediment formation and causes a loss of the volume in storage capacity. This loss can reduce the economical life of the dam and has a negative effect on flood prevention, hydroelectric power generation, irrigation, drinking water supply, recreation, etc. The reduction in the economical life of dams suggests construction of new dams. However, this option is not seen effective because of their construction time, costs and insufficient geographical areas to build them. This thesis provides detailed information on the problem of sediment accumulation which reduces the economical life of the reservoir and on sediment control and removal methods in order to regain economic life of the dams. In addition, an application has been performed on Kesiksuyu (Mehmetli) Dam located in Sumbas town of Osmaniye province using the data of 1963 and 2007. Average sediment accumulation was determined by the finite field method. It was determined that a loss of 17.20 % of the total volume has occurred during the period of 44 years. The obtained temporal change maps were visualized using Geographic Information System (GIS).