Establishment of Remote-Sensing Based Monitoring Program for Health Assessment of the Sacramento Delta

Summary

As climate change progresses in the form of continuous land subsidence and rising sea level, the integrity and reliability of flood-control infrastructure have become ever more essential components to homeland security. This project employed a sensor-based (remote sensing with in-ground instrumentation for validation) and model-aided approach to provide engineers and decision makers with systematic tools to assess the health and provide early warning of deteriorating levee systems. The modeling tool integrated the use of measured data with the concept of performance limit states to effectively achieve a performance-based, network-level health assessment of the levee system. An artificial neural network tool, labeled Risk Estimator for Earth Structures (REES), was developed for the transition of the research findings to the end users.

Investigator