Assessing the Impact of In-Stream Structures on Riverine Geomorphology and Biological Integrity

Abstract

Effect of in-stream grey infrastructures mainly through the dams, weirs, barrages, culvert and bridges has been explored for river system of Lower Ganga River basin using applied geospatial technology, field based geomorphological measurements to reveal the hydro-geomorphological changes and corresponding possible effect on the river ecology. The study finds installation of 96 large over the focused area have been trapped about 1,06,400 million cubic metres (MCM) of water with an average capacity of ~1100 MCM. The installation of undersized stream crossings is also significantly changing the channel form by increased depth, reducing width-depth ratio in the downstream direction of the crossing sites.