Analog‐based meandering channel simulation. Issue 2 (3rd February 2014)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Mariethoz, Gregoire; Comunian, Alessandro; Irarrazaval, Inigo; Renard, Philippe
• Is Part Of: Water resources research. Volume 50:Issue 2(2014:Feb.)
• Page Start: 836
• Page End: 854
• Publication Date: 2014-02-03
• Subjects: Hydrology -- Periodicals; 333.91
• DOI: 10.1002/2013WR013730
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0043-1397

Abstract

<abstract abstract-type="main"> <title>Abstract</title> <p>Characterizing the complex geometries and the heterogeneity of the deposits in meandering river systems is a long‐standing issue for the 3‐D modeling of alluvial formations. Such deposits are important sources of accessible groundwater in alluvial aquifers throughout the world and also play a major role as hydrocarbons reservoirs. In this paper, we present a method to generate meandering river centerlines that are stochastic, geologically realistic, connected, and conditioned to local observations or global geomorphological characteristics. The method is based on fast 1‐D multiple‐point statistics in a transformed curvilinear domain: the succession in directions observed in a real‐world meandering river (the analog) is considered as statistical model for multiple‐point statistics simulation. The integration of local data is accomplished by an inverse procedure ensuring that the channels pass through a given set of locations while conserving the high‐order spatial characteristics of an analog. The methodology is applied on seven real‐world case studies. This work demonstrates the flexibility and the applicability of multiple‐point statistics outside the standard paradigm that considers the simulation of a 2‐D or 3‐D variable with spatial coordinates.</p> </abstract>