PIV experimental study on the flow characteristics upstream of a floating intake in nonlinear stratified ambient conditions

Selective withdrawal is commonly implemented in nonlinearly stratified ambient, which typically has stratified ambient conditions, for purposes of controlling quality. A floating intake is applied as an effective facility of selective withdrawal. However, the outflow dynamics of a floating intake in a nonlinearly stratified ambient have been disregarded, which has a significant effect on the outflow water quality of a reservoir. Experiments were conducted to investigate the effect of thermal stratification on the flow characteristics using particle image velocimetry at three temperature distributions (no stratification, weak stratification and strong stratification). The flow fields upstream of the floating intake showed that the withdrawal layer was formed inhibited by the thermal stratification. And strong stratification produced the thinner withdrawal layer thickness, leading to a larger nonuniform coefficient of the velocity profile. To quantitatively describe the velocity profiles, formulas of dimensionless velocity profiles were proposed. The flow developments were analysed, and the virtual control points located 0.56d above the floating intake (where d is the straight pipe diameter of the floating intake) were obtained. The positions of virtual control points mainly depended on the withdrawal discharge. The decay rate of the velocity along the horizontal line passing through the virtual control point was inversely proportional to the stratification intensity.