ASCE GGB & EWRI April 2024 Meeting: Evaluating Seepage Behavior from Fluctuating River Levels

Program Details: The Oroville Dam in California is the largest embankment dam in the United States and is primarily operated for water supply, hydroelectric power generation, and flood control. In February 2017, the Oroville Dam spillway failed during an unusually wet rainy season. The incident led to mass evacuations of the downstream areas over concerns for the imminent collapse of the dam, affecting more than 180,000 people. Operation of the dam after the spillway failure resulted in large controlled water releases causing occasional high river flows and elevated river levels, erosion of the riverbanks, and flooding of adjoining agricultural lands. River flow conditions from the “Oroville Dam Incident” led to engineering questions about the magnitude and extent of seepage through river levees and beneath the adjacent lands. This presentation examines engineering challenges associated with modeling downstream levee seepage conditions resulting from the Oroville Dam Incident, focusing on the impacts of varying river hydrographs on surrounding agricultural lands.

Speakers: Dr. Tjung is currently a Senior Engineer at Exponent in Oakland, California, USA. He has several years of geotechnical consulting experience including in the San Francisco Bay Area, Hong Kong, and Indonesia. Currently, he focuses on failure analysis and litigation support for infrastructure projects with significant geotechnical aspects. Ezra completed his PhD at the University of California, Berkeley in geotechnical engineering, with a focus on numerical modeling with the Material Point Method and applications to 3D landslides and dam failures. 

Networking: 5:30 - 6:30 PM

Dinner 6:30 - 7:10 PM

Program 7:10 - 8:00 PM

ASCE Golden Gate Branch 530 921 0771 - Ed Wang