Modeling the Hydraulic Effectiveness of a Proposed Storm Surge Barrier System for the Houston Ship Channel during Hurricane Events

AbstractThe Houston Ship Channel (HSC) in Houston, Texas, is home to the second-busiest port in the United States in terms of overall tonnage and contains one of the largest petrochemical complexes in the world. As such, undisturbed operations of the HSC are vital to ensuring the economic prosperity of local, state, and national interests. History has proved that coastal infrastructure systems and operations at the HSC are easily disrupted by severe rainfall and storm surge conditions induced by hurricanes (e.g., Hurricane Ike in 2008). A coupled riverine-coastal hydraulic model was developed to quantitatively evaluate flood and storm surge vulnerability for the HSC and Galveston Bay, Texas, as an initial testbed for simulating extreme flooding scenarios. A numerical investigation was made on the combined interactions of upland runoff and downstream surge occurrences. This includes an evaluation on the hydraulic effectiveness of a proposed surge gate at reducing surge inundation levels inland and near HSC...