Impact of Water Diversion on the Morphological Development of the Lower Yellow River

In this paper we carry out a theoretical analysis based on the general one dimensional morphodynamic model for rivers in order to show how the morphological equilibrium of a river is influenced by water and sediment diversion/supply along the river. The results of the analysis show that large scale water diversions, like those along the Lower Yellow River, can cause the development of a convex riverbed profile in the long - term. In that case deposition will take place along the whole reach of the river, with an increasing deposition depth from downstream to upstream. The slope of the river bed increases from upstream to downstream. Furthermore an analysis on the morphological time scale shows that this development will take a time period in the order of 50 years in the case of the Lower Yellow River.