Water Resources Engineering Laboratory

Overview

The Water Resources Engineering Laboratory (WREL) at the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, IIT Delhi, is a hub for hands-on learning, advanced research, and innovation in water resources for undergraduate and postgraduate students. The lab provides a strong foundation in hydrologic measurement, hydrological processes, water distribution, pumps, turbines, hydraulics, sediment transport, open channel flows, groundwater flow, water quality, remote sensing, and GIS, equipping students with practical skills essential for addressing real-world water management challenges. It offers diverse physical experiments and computational simulations to enable students to understand and analyze complex water-related processes.

Beyond education, the lab serves as a platform for cutting-edge research and innovation, integrating remote sensing, hydrological and hydraulic modeling, machine learning, and climate change studies to explore sustainable water management solutions. With a focus on experiential learning, the lab fosters critical thinking and problem-solving skills, preparing students for careers in water resources engineering. Through structured coursework, guided projects, and interdisciplinary collaboration, WREL ensures students gain both theoretical knowledge and practical expertise while contributing to advancements in water resources research and technology.

Experiments

💧 Hydraulics

Determine the coefficient of discharge (Cd) of a rectangular weir in open channel flow.
Determine Manning's roughness coefficient for an open channel at uniform depth.
Determine friction factor (f) and pipe roughness coefficient for water flow in pipelines of different diameters.
Determine the coefficient of discharge (Cd) of a siphon spillway in open channel flow.
Determine Chezy’s constant (c) and friction factor (f) for an open channel.
Compare pressure losses across expansions, bends, and elbows in a pipeline system.
Verify the Belanger momentum equation by determining energy losses in a hydraulic jump.
Understand the working principle of a propeller turbine by obtaining performance characteristics for different flow rates.
Investigate the operational principles of a Pelton turbine under varying flow rates.
Investigate water hammer pressure.

🔬 Advanced Hydraulics

Determine the specific gravity of iron ore/fly ash.
Determine pH values of iron ore/fly ash slurry at different solid concentrations.
Develop the particle size distribution (PSD) curve for iron ore/fly ash samples.
Estimate the static settled concentration of iron ore/fly ash slurry experimentally.
Study the rheological behavior of iron ore/fly ash slurry.
Determine friction factor and pipe roughness in a pipeline system.
Model multiphase (slurry) flow using CFD Ansys Fluent.

🧪 Water Quality

Determine the concentration of a known chemical substance in a solution.
Determine water quality parameters.
Determine wastewater characteristics.

🌧️ Hydrology

Understand the relation between rainfall and runoff using the water budget equation for a simple catchment.
Use TRMM GPM MATLAB for analyzing and modeling hydrological processes with statistical and probabilistic approaches.
Use QGIS to delineate a watershed for a given outlet using a digital elevation model.
Understand factors affecting the shape of a hydrograph.
Model watershed hydrology using Hec-HMS to simulate runoff and generate hydrographs.
Simulate one-dimensional and two-dimensional flood inundation using Hec-RAS.
Determine the infiltration rate of water into soil using a double-ring infiltrometer.
Find the permeability of an aquifer.

🛰️ Remote Sensing

Geomorphological analysis of a river basin.
Satellite image interpretation.
Aerial photo interpretation.
Stereoscopic 3D visualization.
Image processing.
Image classification.
LULC (Land Use Land Cover) mapping.
NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) modeling.
Integrated use of remote sensing and GIS.

Faculty & Team

Prof. D. R. Kaushal

Areas of Interest: Hydraulic and Water Resources Engineering, Fluid Mechanics, Sediment Transport, Hydraulic Structures, Multiphase Flows, Slurry Pipeline and Flume, Computational Fluid Dynamics, Flow Instrumentation

Email: kaushal@civil.iitd.ac.in

Prof. Dhanya C. T.

Areas of Interest: Hydroclimatological Modelling, Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos Theory, Stochastic Hydrology, Optimisation in Water Resource Systems, Data Mining in Hydrology, Water Resources Management

Email: dhanya@civil.iitd.ac.in

Prof. A. K. Keshari

Areas of Interest: Hydrological and Environmental Modelling, Sustainable Development, Remote Sensing and GIS, FEM, Waste Management and Sewerage System, Policy Analysis and Risk Assessment, Snow and Avalanche

Email: akeshari@civil.iitd.ac.in

Prof. B. R. Chahar

Areas of Interest: Seepage, Drainage, Canal Design

Email: chahar@civil.iitd.ac.in

Prof. Sumedha Chakma

Areas of Interest: Settlement in Landfills, Gas Generation from Landfills, GIS Based Landfill Management, Bioreactor Landfill, Infiltration Characteristics of Different Vegetation and Landuse, Watershed Management, Water Contamination and Remediation, Open Channel Hydraulics, Contaminant Hydrology

Email: chakma@civil.iitd.ac.in

Prof. Saumava Dey

Areas of Interest: Computational Hydraulics, Groundwater Hydrology, Surface Water Hydrology, Hydrological Process Modeling, Geostatistical Modeling

Email: saumavadey@civil.iitd.ac.in

Prof. Gaurav Talukdar

Areas of Interest: Agro-Hydrology, Riverine Ecosystem, Optimization approaches, Hydroclimatic Extremes, Agricultural risk assessment and damage estimation, Mathematical Modeling, WEF nexus, Remote sensing and land use change studies

Email: gtalukdar@civil.iitd.ac.in

Prof. Manabendra Saharia

Areas of Interest: Flood Forecasting, Land Surface Modeling, Radar and Satellite Precipitation, Statistics, and Machine Learning, Human Computation

Email: msaharia@civil.iitd.ac.in

Prof. Rohith A. N.

Areas of Interest: Urban Stormwater Infrastructure Design, Flood Adaptation, Watershed Modelling, Climate Change Impact Assessment, Forecast Informed Decision Making, Hydroclimatic Extremes

Email: anrohith@civil.iitd.ac.in