Procedures to Perform Dam Rehabilitation Analysis in Aging Dams

There are hundreds of existing dams within the State of Virginia, and even thousands more specifically within the United States. A large portion of these dams do not meet the current safety standard of passing the Probable Maximum Flood. Likewise, many of the dams have reached or surpassed the original design lives, and are in need of rehabilitation. A standard protocol will assist dam owners in completing a dam rehabilitation analysis. The protocol provides the methods to complete the hydrologic, hydraulic, and economic analysis. Additionally, alternative augmentation techniques are discussed including the integration of GIS applications and linear programming optimization techniques. The standard protocol and alternative techniques are applied to a case study. The case study includes a set of flood control dams located in the headwaters of the South River watershed in Augusta County, VA. The downstream impacts of the flood control dams on the city of Waynesboro are demonstrated through the hydrologic and hydraulic analysis.