Journal of Japan Society of Dam Engineers

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In recent years, frequent extreme heavy rainfalls exceeding planning levels have been causing shortage of flood control capacity of dams and serious flood damages as a result of extreme-flood control operations that allows the inflowing flood to continue flowing downstream in an unregulated manner. While the scale of flood damage is expected to increase due to climate change, new construction of dams is becoming increasingly difficult. Therefore, more effective operations of existing dams are essential to protect assets of the beneficiary area from floods. This paper propose a dam operation method which will minimize damages in the flood area by the preliminary discharge operation and optimization of the maximum discharge volume based on precipitation forecasts using the recently significantly improved Weather Research and Forecasting Model (WRF). We examined past flood data and verified the effectiveness of integrated management of reservoir storage volume both for flood control and water utilization.

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When an extreme flood event beyond the scale assumed in the flood control plan occurs at a dam site retaining a flood control capacity, so-called “proviso operation (extreme-flood control operation of dams)”, in which the discharge volume is increased significantly to balance the inflow is usually implemented. However, lowering the flood prevention effect of the dam and being not able necessarily to utilize the remaining capacity of the dam remain in the technique as challenges to be solved. In the case of such an extreme flood event, use of the V-R method is considered effective, in which water is discharged with the remaining capacity taken into account. In this study we simulated the use of the V-R method by using the past data. As a result, the effectiveness of the method was verified and the problems it involves were identified. Reasonable methods of application were also proposed.

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