2008 – It’s all in the planning – replacement of a valve under full reservoir head

Stuart Richardson, Peter Liepkalns, Rod Mauger

Abstract: Operations and maintenance of large dams can be complex and potentially high risk. Even on a relatively new dam like Dartmouth, Goulburn-Murray Water is regularly presented with maintenance tasks which are made very difficult because access for maintenance may not have been considered during the original design and construction of the dam.

Goulburn-Murray Water recently completed a change over of a 200mm cast iron gate valve at Dartmouth, not in itself a complex or high risk maintenance task. What made this task challenging was that the valve was subject to full reservoir head (up to 180m) with no means of isolation.