A water pipeline that serves the city of Folsom, Calif., as well as Folsom Prison collapsed Feb. 13 at a Folsom Dam construction site, but officials were able to install a temporary bypass line with no loss or reduction of service. Photo: Kiewit $1.6-billion spillway replacement is joint venture among U.S. Burueau of Reclamation, Army Corps of Engineers, Valley Flood Protection Board and the Sacramento Area Flood Control Agency. The incident involved the permanent 42-in line that was being moved to make way for the second phase of a new spillway project. A temporary 24-in line was placed into service
Engineers from the International Commission on Large Dams will meet with Chinese engineers in China beginning on March 29 to discuss whether a new reservoir might have had a role in triggering last May’s Wenchuan earthquake in Sichuan province. Reservoir-induced seismicity is a known phenomenon, but Chinese authorities dispute its role in the Wenchuan quake. The ICOLD team of a dozen people will include the organization’s chairs and members of its seismic committee.
Lockheed Martin Corp., Bethesda, Md., and Ocean Power Technologies, Pennington, N.J., will work together to develop large, utility-scale ocean-wave-power generation projects in North America. Under the terms of the agreement, Lockheed Martin will manufacture, deploy, operate and maintain the wave systems that have been designed by Ocean Power. Ocean Power’s trademarked PowerBuoy is deployed in 100 ft of water within three miles of shore. The rise and fall of the waves moves a pistonlike structure in the buoy. Lockheed and OPT plan to deploy buoys off the coast of either Oregon or California.
Not a day goes by that Walter Baumy, engineering division chief for the New Orleans District of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, doesn’t get a call or visit from someone who says he has a better mousetrap a better product or method for bringing the Greater New Orleans Hurricane and Storm Damage Risk Reduction System to 100-year levels by 2011. But since the district is now in an all-out push to meet that deadline by rapidly prosecuting designs and contracts in hand, Baumy is wary of the distractions. Photo: Infrastructure Alternatives The Corps seeks new ideas, like this NASA
Literally miles of pile will be installed in New Orleans over the next two years as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers rushes to bring the area’s flood-control system to 100-year protection levels by June 1, 2011. As the largest civil-works project in the area’s history, it could be a very loud job. But so far it isn’t, thanks in part to a quiet hydraulic machine that area engineers are making some noise over. Initially, the Giken unit sits on a reaction stand. Later, it works atop existing pilings and uses them as counterweight. After driving a piling, the rig�s
The U.S. Dept. of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service, which would get $400 million for watershed infrastructure, partners with local sponsors on 14,000 watershed structures throughout the nation, including many aging dams. It has a potential backlog of more than $1 billion worth of flood prevention work to do, says Douglas McKalip, legislative director. But it is up to the local partners to initiate flood prevention projects. The federal share of new construction is 100%, but if fish habitat restoration or recreation improvements or dam rehabilitation are involved the locals have to pick up a 35% share. Many such potential
Authorities are investigating the break of a 66-in. prestressed concrete-cylinder water pipe that flooded busy State Route 190 in Bethesda, Md., on Dec. 23. The pipe, which carries 150,000 gallons per minute, sent water rushing down a nearly half-mile section of the road, stranding more than a dozen vehicles. At least 15 people were plucked from their cars by rescue workers in boats and helicopters. Photo: AP/Wideworld Motorist stranded by water main break in Washington, D.C., suburbs Dec. 23. Ross Contracting Inc., Mount Airy, Md., was awarded a $1.3-million contract by Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission for emergency repairs to the
Facing an unprecedented water crisis, Israel is speeding up plans to desalinate even larger amounts of seawater than it had already planned. The National Infrastructure and Finance Ministries say in early January they will issue a build-operate-transfer tender for the largest reverse osmosis desalination plant in the world, to be built 40 kilometers south of Tel Aviv. In an effort to speed up the construction of other badly needed plants, the Israeli government has also decided to exempt state utility Mekorot Water from the usual tender process for its planned 100 mcm desalination plant at Ashdod. The government has also
Shifting the emphasis of flood risk reduction work from structural, to non-structural efforts, such as better risk communications and improved evacuation planning, is a key recommendation the National Committee on Levee Safety will make in a report to Congress on Jan. 15. Photo: Tom Sawyer/ENR Emphasis would shift from work like this slurry wall construction to bolster levees in Sacramento to improved risk communications and evacuation planning. The levee failures in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina sounded a national alarm on the unreliability of levees for flood protection, the committee concludes. It will recommend greater use of evacuations during periods
A major water main serving the Washington, D.C., metro area broke on the morning of Dec. 23, disrupting service and stranding motorists along a busy suburban artery for several hours. A 66-in pre-stressed concrete cylinder pipe burst along a section that neighbors State Route 190 in the D.C. suburb of Bethesda, Md., at 8 a.m. Several commuters were traveling the four-lane highway during the morning rush hour when the pipe burst. Photo: AP/Wideworld Motorist stranded by water main break in Washington, D.C., suburbs Dec. 23. The pipe, which carries 135-million gallons of water per minute, sent torrents rushing down a
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