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Shane McGrath and Michelle Cowan

Goulburn-Murray Water (G-MW) is a Victorian rural water authority with responsibility for management of the major water systems within a 68,000 square kilometre region. Following a detailed business risk assessment undertaken in 1996, Goulburn-Murray Water developed a ten-year program to commence design reviews and address identified deficiencies at thirteen dams for which G-MW has responsibility.

In October 1997, the Victorian Government announced a $450 million regional water reform package, of which $35 million was provided for rural water authorities dam improvements. $18.5 million was allocated to G-MW on a ‘dollar for dollar’ basis. With contributions from G-MW customers, the current total funding amounts to $37 million.

This paper focuses on processes that G-MW has adopted to manage an accelerated program of dam design review and remedial work.

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1999 Papers

1999 – A Dam Improvement Program – An Owners Perspective
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Shane McGrath and Michelle Cowan

Goulburn-Murray Water (G-MW) is a Victorian rural water authority with responsibility for management of the major water systems within a 68,000 square kilometre region. Following a detailed business risk assessment undertaken in 1996, Goulburn-Murray Water developed a ten-year program to commence design reviews and address identified deficiencies at thirteen dams for which G-MW has responsibility.

In October 1997, the Victorian Government announced a $450 million regional water reform package, of which $35 million was provided for rural water authorities dam improvements. $18.5 million was allocated to G-MW on a ‘dollar for dollar’ basis. With contributions from G-MW customers, the current total funding amounts to $37 million.

This paper focuses on processes that G-MW has adopted to manage an accelerated program of dam design review and remedial work.
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2002 Papers

2002 – Strategic Risk Assessment for Thirteen Victorian Dams
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Richard R. Davidson, Shane McGrath, Adrian Bowden, Andrew Reynolds

Goulburn-Murray Water (G-MW) manages thirteen major dams for the State of Victoria. As part of its Dam Improvement Program (DIP), five priority dams were identified for detailed safety and performance evaluation. Over the last three years, the design reviews have been completed and a series of dam safety issues have been identified which pose societal and financial risk. Substantial financial resources will be required to be applied over a considerable period to bring these dams into compliance with established international and Australian standards. Which of these dam safety issues should be addressed first? In what sequence and with what urgency should the actions be implemented? Can cost-effective interim targets be set? How can the remaining eight
dams, which could also pose societal and financial risk, be prioritised for future detailed investigation? To answer these questions a quantitative risk assessment approach was used. The approach utilised expert engineering and consequence panels and included input to and review of the process and outcomes by a stakeholder reference panel reporting directly to the Board of G-MW. The implementation of a strategic risk management process has now begun to progressively and systematically reduce the dam safety risk across the entire dams portfolio. This process recognises that available funding for risk reduction measures is very limited, so the highest risks are reduced in an incremental fashion to achieve interim risk targets and eventually meet contemporary dam safety standards.
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2005 Papers

2005 – The Eildon Dam Improvement Project – Another Alliancing Success Story
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Steven Fox, Robert Cooper, Shane McGrath

The Project Alliance delivery model is becoming more popular within the dams industry as owners, designers and constructors seek more effective ways to deliver upgrades that are needed to meet
contemporary community expectations whilst managing the significant safety and commercial risks
typical of these projects.

The Eildon Alliance has recently completed the Eild on Dam Improvement Project on behalf of Goulburn- Murray Water. This $52 M project involved reconstruction and raising of the upper portion of the 80 m high embankment, works to strengthen the spillway chute to cope with larger flood events and refurbishment of the original 50 year old spillway mechanical equipment.

The Eildon Alliance was responsible for the detailed design, construction, commissioning and project
management of this major upgrade. To be successful, a project alliance requires
the alliance partners to adopt a cooperative approach throughout the project. This paper de
tails the benefits that this cooperation provided at Eildon, reasons for selecting the alliance project delivery model and the outcomes achieved.
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2006 Papers

2006 – ALARP Considerations for Dam Safety – Are We There Yet?
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Peter Allen, Malcolm Barker, Shane McGrath and Chris Topham

Are we there Yet? The question we all ask in Tolerability of Risk. The answer is in the journey, which we are all on as owners, regulators or designers.

A number of authorities in Australia are applying risk assessment for the evaluation of dam safety upgrades in accordance with the October 2003 ANCOLD Guidelines on Risk Assessment. A fundamental requirement for the evaluation of risk below the limit of tolerability is the use of the As Low As Reasonably Practicable(ALARP) principle. In making a judgement as to whether an ALARP position may have been reached, ANCOLD suggest the evaluation of a Cost to Save a Statistical Life, good practice, level of existing risk, social concerns, affordability and duration of risk. ANCOLD also suggests consideration of the USBR Criteria for evaluating risk. Recent guidelines on the Acceptable Flood Capacity for Dams developed by the Queensland Dam Safety Regulator provide further insight into the application of ALARP.

The objective of the paper is to make dam owners, regulators and designers aware of some current practice regarding the evaluation of ALARP in Australia, highlight the challenges of applying this principle and to encourage further discussion.
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2015 Papers

2015 – Benchmarking Dam Safety Management in Victoria
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David Stewart, Shane McGrath & Siraj Perera

Dam safety in Victoria is overseen by the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning on behalf of the relevant Minister and under the Water Act. For each of the 19 state-owned Water Corporations, Government has issued a Statement of Obligations which describes all responsibilities of the Corporation, including specific reference to dam safety management and ANCOLD Guidelines.

These Corporations report annually to the Department on their compliance with all their obligations, including dam safety management. In late 2014, 13 Water Corporations along with the Department commissioned a comparative benchmarking study of dam safety management practices across the state. This work was facilitated by the VicWater Dams Industry Working Group. The study used a rapid assessment method against 14 separate criteria for dam safety management, based on the Statements of Obligations, guidance notes developed by the Department, ANCOLD Guidelines, the ICOLD Draft Bulletin on Dam Safety Management, good governance principles and examples of best practice from other jurisdictions.

The study involved assessment of background data, site inspections and discussions with various individuals of each owner, including a range of field staff, dam safety staff, Executive Managers, Managing Directors and Board Directors. The benchmarking study covered 142 dams of Significant, High and Extreme Consequence Category throughout Victoria.

The results of the benchmarking study have been extremely useful for individual dam owners and for the Department to understand areas where good practice is in place and also where there is potential for improvement of individual programs. The study also provides a measure of assurance of the current status of dam safety management practices and areas where regulatory practices could be better focused. It also reinforced the importance of strong industry networks such as ANCOLD and VicWater for knowledge transfer, capacity development and sustainability of dam safety management practices.

This paper presents the methodology used for the benchmarking study and its broader findings. It also highlights good practice considerations for dam owners, regulators and other dam safety practitioners.

Keywords: Dam Safety Management, Governance, Benchmarking
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2016 Papers

2016 – The Use of a Safety Case to Demonstrate ALARP
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Shane McGrath, Stuart Richardson, Mark Arnold

Melbourne Water Corporation has recently completed a complex safety upgrade of Greenvale, an extreme consequence category dam. An assessment concluded that the residual risks were As Low as Reasonably Practicable (ALARP). However, given the uncertainty associated with the calculations the estimated residual societal risk was not comfortably below the limit of tolerability. Melbourne Water has experience with preparing hazardous industry safety cases for its water treatment chemical storages and decided to trial the methodology for Greenvale Dam. This paper describes the approach taken in hazardous industries to construct safety cases and how his was adapted to demonstrate that dam safety risks are ALARP.
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2020 Papers

2020 – The Safety Case
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Shane McGrath, Mark Arnold, Josh Rankin, Gavan Hunter

Greenvale Dam is a critical storage for the supply of potable water to Melbourne. The dam had been upgraded through current risk management techniques, and an ALARP assessment completed at that time. However, it was decided that a more comprehensive demonstration of ALARP was warranted to satisfy the dam owner’s duty of care. Since there is no comprehensive guidance in the dams industry for owners and their advisors to reference, the safety case approach used extensively in other hazardous industries was adopted. Considering the approaches used by Victoria’s Worksafe, the Institution of Engineers Australia and the National Offshore Petroleum Safety and Environmental Management Authority (NOPSEMA), the key components of the safety case for Greenvale dam were identified then developed to provide a logical, structured and comprehensive argument for the safety of Greenvale Dam. This paper provides an overview of components of the safety case developed for Greenvale Dam, the use of safety cases for dams and where process improvements could be made.
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2014 Papers

2014 – Is it Safe Enough? The Dam Safety Case
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Shane McGrath, Phillip Cummins, and David Stewart

Dam owners and regulators now commonly use risk assessment techniques to assist with decision making for an individual dam or a portfolio of dams. In many cases risk assessment is used to select an optimal course of action in relation to ongoing safety performance of dams, including the achievement of public safety objectives. However, whilst it is an important tool, the use of risk assessment alone is not sufficient to establish that a dam is “safe”.
In modern organisations, business objectives are achieved through a systematic approach to management which described simply sets out what needs to be achieved, how the required outcomes will be delivered and audits the process and results.
In hazardous industries such as mining, chemical, nuclear and dams, it is necessary to reliably achieve business objectives such as product volumes, unit costs and workplace health and safety alongside public safety objectives. In the dams industry, dam safety management systems are now being implemented to document how the organisation satisfies its corporate and business objectives, governance responsibilities and risk management processes.
It is also common in hazardous industries that a “safety case” is required by regulators to demonstrate that the owner has identified what could go wrong at its facility, what controls are in place and that there is a system in place to ensure that the controls are reliable. Whilst dam owners may rely on a dam safety risk assessment to meet regulatory obligations and demonstrate due diligence, the results of risk assessments are not routinely documented sufficiently to satisfy a “safety case” and therefore will not fully meet the organisation’s requirements.
Many dam owners are also responsible for the safety management of other hazardous facilities, such as urban water and mining corporations which typically manage hazardous chemical installations and hazardous or toxic waste disposal. For such organisations, the corporate awareness and processes should already exist to extend the “safety case” philosophy to the management of their dams.
This paper sets out the importance of a dam “safety case”, the essential elements of a safety case and its relationship to the dam safety management system.
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2012 Papers

2012 – 15 Years of Experience with a Dam Improvement Program
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Shane McGrath, Andrew Reynolds, Garry Fyfe, Chris Kelly, Steven Fox

Goulburn-Murray Water is a rural water corporation located in Northern Victoria. It has responsibility for 12 State dams and is also the constructing authority for the Murray Darling Basin Authority’s Victorian assets.

Over the past 15 years G-MW has been engaged in a dam improvement program across its portfolio. To date 14 individual projects have been undertaken at 11 dams. The total expenditure is $125 million.

Starting from a base level of data at its inception in 1997, the program has encompassed all facets required for a dam improvement program. From early prioritisation to set the investigation program, through design reviews and risk assessments to develop the upgrading program and subsequent implementation. Some elements of the program were at the leading edge of practice at the time and a range of experiences along the way were character building as dam safety investment challenged other corporate priorities.

This paper sets out the lessons learned in developing the methodology and implementing the program of works, particularly relating to corporate adoption of the program, organisational capability, investigations, risk assessments, design and implementation.
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