Posted on 02/12/2017 4:26:47 PM PST by janetjanet998
Edited on 02/12/2017 9:33:58 PM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
Oroville Dam: DWR still expects feds to pay bulk of spillway repair costs
By Steve Schoonover, Chico Enterprise-Record |
PUBLISHED: February 22, 2018 at 10:46 am
Oroville – The state Department of Water Resources is still expecting the federal government to pay the bulk of the cost of repairing the Lake Oroville spillways.
The estimated cost is up to $870 million, and north state congressmen had indicated the Federal Emergency Management Agency had some doubts whether it could reimburse costs for a redesigned structure.
But DWR spokeswoman Erin Mellon said during a media call Wednesday that FEMA has paid 75 percent of costs that have been submitted thus far, and the state has no indication that is going to change.
In response to a question, Mellon said there had been a setback in getting the sixth hydroelectric generating turbine in the Hyatt Powerhouse back online.
Only five have been functioning since one broke in August 2015. It was thought earlier that the sixth would be back online mid-year, but Mellon said a test of a shut-off valve indicted additional repairs were needed. The target date has been moved back to the end of the year.
Getting the sixth turbine going would increase the amount of water that could be released from the lake through the powerhouse from 14,700 cubic feet per second to about 17,000 cfs.
Petersen said Kiewit planned to be ready May 1 to start phase 2 of the main spillway reconstruction. The start date will depend on the lake level, weather and other factors, however.
The program of work includes removal of the 730 feet at the top of the upper chute from the radial gates, and replacement with steel-reinforced structural concrete.
A 2.5-foot layer of steel-reinforced structural concrete will be placed over the over 1,050 feet of roller compacted concrete in the middle chute, and the roller compacted concrete walls of that section will be replaced with structural concrete.
The energy dissipaters at the base of the spillway also will be hydro-blasting and resurfaced.
well after a very dry start is has been very wet..lake level 794 feet..a very warm and wet system will be moving in....looks like they might have to test the spillway after all
Lake Oroville: Potential use of main spillway next week
SACRAMENTO April 3, 2018 – Forecasted storms expected in the Feather River basin this weekend may require using Lake Oroville’s flood control outlet spillway (also known as the main spillway) this week or next.
After last year’s spillway incident, the Department created the 2017/18 Lake Oroville Winter Operations Plan to ensure public safety in the event of major storm events. This plan triggers more aggressive outflow from Hyatt Powerplant and potential use of the main spillway should the reservoir’s elevation reach 830 feet during the month of April. The current forecasts show the potential for inflows to raise the reservoir to near the 830-foot trigger elevation by the middle of next week. Currently, the lake elevation is 794 feet.
In anticipation of the incoming weather, DWR began increasing outflows today, April 3, from Hyatt Powerplant to approximately 10,000 cfs. The total capacity of outflows from Hyatt Powerplant is currently 12,500 cfs. If necessary, DWR also has use of the River Valve Outlet System which has an additional maximum outflow capacity of 4,000 cfs.
There was a relatively warm storm last week in the basin and a big one forecast for Friday.
update form Juan
Oroville Update 4 April 18 “The Calm Before the Storm”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOppi-IBtDw
Thanks! Current raining below about 9,000 feet.
Rain shuts Yosemite, threatens problems at tallest US dam
-
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2018/04/06/california-storm-may-test-spillway-at-nations-tallest-dam.html
-
To the north, state officials warned this week that they may have to use
the partially rebuilt spillway at Oroville Dam for the first time since
repairs began on the badly damaged structure last summer.
Behind the dam, Lake Oroville has been filling up all winter,
and more water was coming in than flowing out Friday.
The water level was last at 793 feet.
If it reaches about 830 feet (253 meters), water managers say
they will open the gates to the spillway.
Glad to see an update from Branco Lirio!
in the flyover video there are 2 wet spots on the spillway..one is in the middle at the new RCC location..DWR said this is form rainwater runoff since there is no drainage system yet in that area...
But why is water seeping out at the top near the gates? The water level is well below the gate level...?
well the wet storm is winding down so far 4 inches fell at the Dam and -66.5 in the higher elevations with snowmelt..more showers today ..then a break and weaker/drier systems later in the week
inflow is now 50,000 and rising... outflow 12,000..lake level 795 feet
DWR has said its projections suggest the main spillway may need to be used sometime next week. They’ve also indicated the rougher surface of the roller-compacted concrete part of the spillway chute could cause turbulence, which could cause damage.
A new surface of structural concrete is scheduled to placed over that part of the spillway this year.http://www.orovillemr.com/article/NB/20180406/NEWS/180409806
now they are saying the spillway won’t be used...
After heavy rains, first use of partly rebuilt Oroville Dam spillway now ‘unlikely’
After a spring storm system dumped 5 to 7 inches of rain into the Feather River basin over the weekend, state officials said Sunday they likely won’t have to use the partly rebuilt flood control spillway at Oroville Dam after all.
Last week, the California Department of Water Resources said the storm might cause water levels in the Lake Oroville reservoir to rise to the “trigger elevation” of 830 feet. At that point, DWR officials planned to open the spillway gates and release water down the 3,000-foot-long concrete chute..
But the lake level only reached 799.7 feet over the weekend, according to DWR.
http://www.westernfarmpress.com/regulatory/oroville-spillway-work-resumes-funding-questions-linger
Oroville spillway work resumes as funding questions linger
Crews began the second phase of work on the Oroville Dam’s main spillway on May 8 as questions remain over how much of the dam’s reconstruction project will be eligible for federal reimbursement.
Tim Hearden | May 10, 2018
Construction resumed on the Oroville Dam’s main spillway this week as a cloud remains over potential Federal Emergency Management Agency reimbursements for the project.
Crews hired by the State Department of Water Resources began the second phase of repairs to the spillway at 12:01 a.m. May 8, and began preparing to remove the temporary roller-compacted concrete walls in its middle section.
This summer, crews from Kiewit Infrastructure Co. will replace the temporary walls with permanent, structural concrete walls and add other concrete walls and slabs to the structure, state officials explain. As they did last year, workers will aim to finish the main spillway by Nov. 1, says Jeff Petersen, the Omaha, Neb.-based company’s project director.
“Yesterday was an exciting day at the project,” Petersen told reporters May 9 in a conference call.
Work also continues on the emergency spillway, including adding a concrete cap to secure a new underground cutoff wall and the completion of a concrete splashpad on the hillside below the spillway, officials say.
Funding in doubt
The work proceeds amid lingering uncertainty about funding for the project, as FEMA told two California congressmen in a May 2 letter that an unfavorable independent review of the DWR’s management of the Oroville Dam may jeopardize federal reimbursements.
The letter was in response to one sent in February by U.S. Reps. John Garamendi, a Democrat, and Doug LaMalfa, a Republican, seeking clarification on whether the state’s perceived mismanagement of the dam could affect funding. The state has asked for 75 percent of the two-year project’s estimated $870 million price tag, with the State Water Project contractors paying the rest.
FEMA regional administrator Robert J. Fenton told the lawmakers the agency will evaluate the Independent Forensic Team’s report as well as “inspection, maintenance and repair records” and “meetings with DWR and the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Service” in determining Oroville funding.
“In addition, FEMA will continue to review all relevant information thoroughly to determine and process eligibility reimbursements,” Brandi Richard, a spokeswoman in the agency’s Oakland, Calif., regional office, told Western Farm Press in an email. “Some expenses needed to make repairs to the dam, spillway and associated facilities may not be eligible under FEMA’s disaster programs.”
Richard added that each claim that DWR submits would be evaluated, and she said she couldn’t speculate on whether claims would be eligible or not until the review process is complete.
FEMA has noted that in past disasters when there was a “lack of maintenance,” they only had the legal authority to provide reimbursements for work to bring facilities back to their “pre-disaster design,” LaMalfa and Garamendi explain. In Oroville’s case, that would merely “return the spillways to the same condition that played a role in causing the disaster in the first place,” LaMalfa contends.
However, Fenton told the congressmen that hazard mitigation grant funds – another pot of money – could be used to upgrade facilities.
Requests to continue
DWR spokeswoman Erin Mellon says the agency will continue to submit reimbursement requests to FEMA until it is told otherwise.
“They have not rejected any of our reimbursement claims” so far, Mellon said during the conference call. “If that does happen, there would be no changes to the construction plan.”
FEMA reimbursements are sought in chunks. Of the $870 million in total project costs, $160 million was for immediate emergency response costs, Mellon says. Work required as a direct result of a disaster is definitely eligible for FEMA funding, Fenton explained.
The questions about funding came after a forensic team commissioned to study the dam’s near-failure issued a 584-page report in January that largely blames a culture of complacency within the DWR that insulated the agency from access to industry knowledge and technical expertise to safeguard the dam and its mile-long spillway.
The DWR initiated several measures as a result, including designing the reconstruction in a way that prevents potential physical causes of last year’s emergency from happening again, Mellon has explained.
The agency’s newly appointed director, Karla Nemeth, will oversee a restructured executive team that will include a new deputy director for flood management and dam safety. Further, Gov. Jerry Brown last year ordered additional evaluations of dams with spillways similar to Oroville’s.
Finally, the DWR is kicking off a comprehensive needs assessment “to see what we need to do differently in our operation of the structures,” Mellon said in April.
Lake Oroville is the chief reservoir for the State Water Project, whose contractors irrigate about 750,000 acres of Central Valley farmland and serve more than 26 million customers, according to the project’s website. The dam’s near-failure amid heavy storms in February, 2017, prompted the reconstruction project.
The spillway camera is working again. Phase 2 is well underway.
http://www.parks.ca.gov/live/lakeorovillesra_spillway
Thanks! I’ve been meaning to look in on this operation.
Your welcome, Here is lake level info. It is different from last year.
http://cdec.water.ca.gov/dynamicapp/QueryF?s=ORO
Full title: “Oroville Dam Quakes in February Related to Spillway Discharge”, located on the Seismological Society of America website.
www.seismosoc.org/news/BSSA/Oroville....
Interesting. Here is a LA Times article about earthquakes at the dam a few weeks after the spillway failure.
https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-oroville-earthquake-20170302-story.html
DWR increasing Hyatt Powerplant releases, water reaches Oroville Dam spillway gates
POLITICS
FEMA is refusing to pay California more than $300 million to repair the nation’s tallest earthen dam
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3733377/posts
Californians’ water bills could climb after Trump’s FEMA won’t pay $300M for Oroville Dam
The Sacremento Bee ^ | March 8, 2019 | Dale Kasler & Ryan Sabalow
Posted on 3/9/2019, 1:46:55 PM by abb
Thanks for the update
Regards
alfa6 ;>}
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.