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The side of a levee in Sacramento, California. A levee (/ ˈ l ɛ v i / or / ˈ l ɛ v eɪ /), [a] [1] dike (American English), dyke (British English; see spelling differences), embankment, floodbank, or stop bank is an elevated ridge, natural or artificial, alongside the banks of a river, often intended to protect against flooding of the area adjoining the river.
An artistic impression of a tidal barrage, including embankments, a ship lock, and caissons housing a sluice and two turbines. The barrage method of extracting tidal energy involves building a barrage across a bay or river that is subject to tidal flow. Turbines installed in the barrage wall generate power as water flows in and out of the ...
Embankment (earthworks), a raised bank to carry a road, railway, or canal across a low-lying or wet area; Embankment dam, a dam made of mounded earth and rock; Land reclamation along river banks, usually marked by roads and walkways running along it, parallel to the river, as in:
The Netherlands has a large area of polders: as much as 20% of the land area has at some point in the past been reclaimed from the sea, thus contributing to the development of the country. IJsselmeer is the most famous polder project of the Netherlands. Some other countries which have polders are Bangladesh, Belgium, Canada and China.
Cattle grazing below high water, Isle of Dogs, 1792 (Robert Dodd, detail: National Maritime Museum) The Embanking of the tidal Thames is the historical process by which the lower River Thames, at one time a shallow waterway, perhaps five times broader than today, winding through malarious marshlands, has been transformed by human intervention into a deep, narrow tidal canal flowing between ...
By placing these embankments somewhat back from the margin of the river-bed, a wide flood-channel is provided for the discharge of the river as soon as it overflows its banks, while leaving the natural channel unaltered for the ordinary flow. Low embankments may be sufficient where only exceptional summer floods have to be excluded from meadows.
It involves the management of water movement, such as redirecting flood run-off through the use of floodwalls and flood gates to prevent floodwaters from reaching a particular area. Flood mitigation is a related but separate concept describing a broader set of strategies taken to reduce flood risk and potential impact while improving resilience ...
Canals need to be level, and while small irregularities in the lie of the land can be dealt with through cuttings and embankments, for larger deviations other approaches have been adopted. The most common is the pound lock , which consists of a chamber within which the water level can be raised or lowered connecting either two pieces of canal ...