Spill Monitoring at Lillgrund

Determination of spill
May 17; June 1; and June 13, 2006

Vattenfall AB June, 2006

Spill Monitoring at Lillgrund Agern Allé 5
DK-2970 Hørsholm, Denmark

Determination of spill Tel: +45 4516 9200

May 17; June 1; and June 13, 2006 Fax: +45 4516 9292
Dept. fax:
e-mail: dhi@dhigroup.com
Web: www.dhigroup.com

Client Client’s representative

Vattenfall AB Thomas Davy

Project Project No

Spill Monitoring on Lillgrund 53445

Authors Date
June, 2006
Ulrik Lumborg
Approved by

ULU KAE ANJ 17-07-06

Revision Description By Checked Approved Date

Key words Classification

Spill monitoring, Lillgrund Open

Internal

Proprietary

Distribution No of copies

Vattenfall Thomas Davy

DHI: ULU, JAO 2
CONTENTS

1 INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................1-1

2 METHODS .................................................................................................................2-1

3 RESULTS ..................................................................................................................3-1

4 CONCLUSIONS.........................................................................................................4-1

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1 INTRODUCTION
This technical note describes monitoring of sediment spill relating from the dredging
operations during construction of the Lillgrund offshore wind power plant. Vattenfall
AB has commissioned DHI – Water and Environment to monitor spilled sediment relat-
ing from dredging operations at Lillgrund during the construction phase.

The general weekly monitoring is based on a numerical modeling complex (MIKE 3)

that can model the spreading and deposition of spilled sediment based on modelled hy-
drodynamics (water currents and – levels).

The set up of the numerical modeling complex requires information of the spilled
amounts. The dredging company delivers weekly reports on the dredged amounts. The
aim of the present study is to establish the percentage of the dredged amount that is
spilled.

The present note describes measurements taken in order to establish the spill percent-
age. Transect measurements were carried out in order to measure the flux of sediment in
the spill plume. Using information on the dredged amounts, the spill percentage was
calculated.

The monitoring was carried out on three dates, May 17; June 1; and June 13, 2006. The
spill was monitored in the sediment plume originating from dredging from the vessel
Grete Fighter. The measurements took about three hours each monitoring day.

The spill percentages range between 4.4% and 5.4% with an average of 4.8%.

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2 METHODS
The measurements of the spill were carried out using the equipment listed in Table 2.1:

Table 2.1 Equipment used for sediment spill measurements at Lillgrund

Instrument Measures
ADCP (Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler)  Currents
 SSC
CTD (Conductivity, Temperature, Depth)  Salinity
 Water temperature
 Depth
OBS (Optical Backscatter)  Suspended sediment
concentration (SSC)
GPS (Global Positioning System)  Locations
Echo sounder  Depth
Depth integrated water sampler  For taking in situ water
samples
MasterSizer 2000  Laboratory analysis of
sediment grain sizes

The spill was monitored from the DHI vessel M/S Maritina. On all monitoring days the
plume was monitored for around three hours.

After arrival at the dredging site, the spill plume near the dredger was identified by eye.
Hereafter, CTD- and OBS-profiles (see Table 2.1) was attempted to be taken outside
and inside the plume with according water samples.

The sediment plume was investigated 200 m from the dredger in order to allow the
sediment to fully disperse in the water column and to allow coarse grained sediment to
settle out. In this way only the fine-grained sediment spill is monitored. The sediment
concentrations were monitored using an ADCP system.

Along with the online ADCP monitoring; CTD- and OBS-profiles and water samples
were taken about every half hour for calibration purposes.

After the measurements were taken, all water samples were filtered and the actual sus-
pended sediment concentration was determined. The filtration was made on pre weighed
Millipore CEM filters with a nominal filter diameter of 0.45 µm. The filters with the
sediment were weighed and the suspended sediment concentration was determined.

On three of the samples further the grain size distribution was determined using a laser
measurement technique which reveals an accurate measure of the grain sizes.

The suspended sediment concentrations from the field water samples were used for
calibration of the OBS sensor. The OBS sensor measures the backscatter when light is
extended in the water column and returns a signal in mV. The OBS signal can be con-
verted to suspended sediment concentration using a linear calibration that is dependent

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 on the sediment type. Therefore linear correlation was made between the measurements
and the OBS measurements.

All data was processed using the software VISEA Data Acquisition Software and
VISEA Plume Detection Toolbox version 2.16. The software is developed by Aqua Vi-
sion, the Netherlands. The system makes it possible to monitor all components online as
the measurements are executed.

After the measurement campaign is finished all parameters are reprocessed including
the sediment concentrations from the water samples and the grain size distribution.

The software computes, among other things, the current velocities and the suspended
sediment concentrations at a number of layers down through the water column with
depth intervals of 20 cm. By a combination of the current velocities, the depth, and the
suspended sediment concentrations the software also computes the total sediment flux
(in kg/s).

Figure 2.1 Screenshot of the VISEA Plume Detection Toolbox. The suspended sediment concentration
distribution in the water column is shown in the main window. To the right, a number of pa-
rameters may be monitored: SSC in the actual point as profiles and further the temperature,
salinity and concentration from the CTD/OBS sensors. Finally the total flux of sediment is
displayed.

The spill percentage is computed as the relationship between the dredged amount in kg
s-1 and the flux of sediment 200 m from the dredger. It was decided to compute an aver-
age dredging rate in order to estimate the average spill percentage. In some cases,

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 dredging of small volumes over a long time period was reported from the dredging
company. In this case, the result would be a very low dredging rate and consequently an
unrealistically high spill percentage.

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3 RESULTS
The general results from the field surveys indicate that the suspended sediment concen-
trations are generally below 10 mg l-1 200 m from the dredger. The majority of the field
samples yield concentrations in the interval 1.2 mg l-1  5.5 mg l-1. When the ADCP
signal is converted to concentrations, a more detailed picture is shown and concentra-
tions up to 7 mg l-1 are seen. Only rarely the ADCP signal shows concentrations in ex-
cess of 10 mg l-1.

The grain size distribution was determined on the sediment originating from three water
samples using a laser measurement technique. The median grain size was determined as
4.2 µm.

The dredging amounts are reported from the dredging company on a weekly basis. The
dredging is reported in m3. The reported dredging is converted to kg by multiplication
of an average density (sed) of sediments in Øresund of 1,970 kg m-3. The dredging rate
in kg s-1 is then computed as the total dredging divided by the time:

Dredging (m 3 )   sed (kg m -3 )

Dredging rate (kg s -1 )  .
Dredging time (sec)

The spill percentage can then be computed as the flux of sediment divided by the dredg-
ing rate:

Dredging rate (kg s -1 )

Spill percentage   100
Measured sediment flux (kg s -1 )

A total of 115 dredging events from April 8, 2006 to June 18, 2006 were investigated in
this matter with the statistics presented in Table 3.1.

Table 3.1 Statistical values for the dredging rates at Lillgrund concerning the period from April 8 to
June 18, 2006
-1
Minimum dredging rate 3.2 kg s
-1
Maximum dredging rate 102.2 kg s
-1
Average dredging rate 33.5 kg s

The spill monitoring was carried out while the dredger was working at average speed.
Therefore, it was decided to use the average dredging rate for computation of the spill
percentage. The monitored fluxes and resulting spill percentages are presented in Table
3.2. The average spill percentage for the three days in question was computed as 4.8%.

Table 3.2 Measured sediment flux and computed spill percentages for the three monitoring days.

Date Measured flux Resulting spill percentage

-1
May 17, 2006 1.5 kg s 4.5%
-1
June 1, 2006 1.8 kg s 5.5%
-1
June 13, 2006 1.5 kg s 4.4%

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4 CONCLUSIONS
Sediment plumes originating from dredging at the Lillgrund offshore power plant area
was measured on May 17; June 1; and June 13, 2006.

The sediment fluxes were monitored using and ADCP system combined with other
probes for calibration purposes. The spill percentage was computed based on the meas-
ured sediment fluxes and an average dredging rate of 33.5 kg s-1. The spill percentages
were computed in the interval 4.4% – 5.4% with an average of 4.8%.

During the weekly executions of the numerical model complex, a spill of 4.5% of the
dredged amount will be used as spill measurements carried out for the dredging com-
pany (PHJV) indicated a slightly lower average value than the present investigation.

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