2004 – Communicating Dam Safety Practices to the Community for a 60km Long Canal Hydro Development in New Zealand

Peter D Amos, Pip Nicolson, M Grant Webby, Murray D Gillon

To obtain a resource consent to build and operate any new water resource or hydro-electric development in New Zealand, the developer is required by the Resource Management Act (RMA) to consult with the community over the effects that the development could have, including describing how public safety risks will be avoided, remedied or mitigated. The community has the opportunity to respond to the authorities issuing the resource consent and influence the conditions attached to the consent.

The proposed Project Aqua Scheme in the South Island, New Zealand, comprised a 60 km long canal system to convey 340 cumecs flow from the Waitaki River across alluvial river terraces and through a chain of six hydro-power stations before returning the water back to the river. Each section of canal between stations would have contained between 4 and 6 million m3 of water within embankments up to 20m high. A breach of any one of these canals had the potential to flood farmland, residential buildings, highways, and other infrastructure, thereby posing a safety risk to local residents together with the potential for significant economic loss.

The paper describes the methodologies that were developed and used to assess the impacts, the measures proposed to avoid, remedy or mitigate safety risks and the public reaction to the associated report that was provided for public consultation prior to abandonment of the project. The methodologies used required adaptation of dam safety and consequence assessment practices usually applied to in-river dams, and applied here to the 60 km long length of canal embankment.

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