Introduction to the Protections 2014 Seminar

The technology of dam protections has undergone major advancement. The increasing demand for safety in modern societies has created the need for cost-effective measures to protect critical infrastructure such as dams. This situation resulted in the drafting of new regulations and technical manuals in countries like Norway, Sweden, and the USA, among others.

Although different dam protection techniques have been applied to many dams all over the world, many of the applications have not been tested and the technology is still not mature. Therefore, additional research is still necessary to improve the current design criteria.

This seminar took place at ETSI de Caminos, Canales y Puertos of the Technical University of Madrid (Spain) in November of 2014. Among other subjects, attention was given to embankment and masonry dam failures as well as in soft and hard protections for embankment dams. Regarding the new regulatory drafts, the technical manual “Overtopping Protection for Dams”, developed by the US Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), was also presented at the seminar.

As a result, a book containing a selection of the proceedings of the 1st International Seminar on Dam Protections against Overtopping and Accidental Leakage was published by CRC Press/Balkema.