Resolving Emerging Issues with Aging Dams under Climate Change Projections

Abstract

Concerns about the collapse of dams due to overtopping are increasing owing to heavy rainfall and frequent typhoons associated with climate change. As a result, there has been a spike in anxiety among residents living near the downstream areas of dams. Although the dangers associated with dam safety are increasing, there is still a lack of comprehensive dam rehabilitation and implementation frameworks that consider climate change. A thorough review of existing dam facilities is needed in light of climate change and the deteriorating conditions of aging dams. In this study, we performed a hydrological safety assessment and developed a dam rehabilitation implementation framework to proactively diagnose and resolve dam safety issues caused by climate change and aging water infrastructure. The dam rehabilitation assessment framework has three main facets: appropriateness of evaluation components, importance of weighted analysis, and comprehensive dam rehabilitation assessment and implementation framework. The proposed approach was applied to selected sites with high feasibility of dam rehabilitation in Korea’s major river basins considering different climate change scenarios.