EMERGENCY ACTION PLANS - RECENT PORTUGUESE

EXPERIENCE
Paulo Castro*, Arnaldo Nisa*, and Marta Duque*
*
Agência Portuguesa do Ambiente (APA)
Rua da Murgueira,9/9A - Zambujal, Ap. 7585
2610-124 Amadora, Portugal
e-mail: geral@apambiente.pt, webpage: http://www.apambiente.pt

Keywords: Dams, Safety, Emergency

Abstract. Emergency Action Plans (EAP´s) play a key role in the overall Emergency
Preparedness Planning of dams, particularly by defining the potential emergency
conditions that may occur at the dam structures and by stating the actions and procedures
to be carried out by the Dam Owners to minimize environment impacts, property damage
and loss of life in the downstream valleys.
Following the publication of Decree-Law 2007/344, which updated the main Dam Safety
Regulations in Portugal, an increased attention has been given by the different Dam Safety
stakeholders for the need to prepare, upgrade and implement Emergency Action Plans to
the Class I (high consequence) dams.
In spite of all the information available about this subject from different sources, the variety
of topics included in the preparation of the EAP documents and the interrelation to be
reached between the different players before, during and after an emergency occurrence,
has in some situations introduced a level of unexpected complexity in a seemingly
straightforward process.
This paper aims to share with the technical community the recent experience of the
Portuguese Dam Safety Authority dealing with the EAP´s, with a view to highlight a
number of concerns related with its elaboration, evaluation and implementation.

1 INTRODUCTION
In Portugal, the Portuguese Environment Agency (APA - Agência Portuguesa do
Ambiente) holds the responsibility to carry out the Dam Safety Regulator role, by enforcing
the legal dam safety regulations, which is done through the Dam Safety Division (GSB).
This task is accomplished with the support of other departments within APA, and the
collaboration of the National Laboratory of Civil Engineering (LNEC) and the Civil
Protection Authority (Autoridade Nacional de Proteção Civil - ANPC), particularly in what
concerns Class I (High Consequence) dams.
Whilst the size of the country may be considered relatively small, a wide variety of
landscapes, geologic formations and climate characteristics may be found within its
territory. This comprehensive set of natural and manmade conditions constitute both a
challenge and an opportunity to address different sorts of technical problems and
methodologies, particularly in what concerns the operation of the country´s infrastructures.
In this context, planning and implementing emergency planning and procedures is many
times a rather complex task, keeping in mind that these matters must, at any time, remain
a critical issue within the overall Civil Protection structure.
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Among all the themes related to the implementation of the Dam Safety policies, it is
never too much to stress the importance of the Emergency Action Plans (EAP´s) as relevant
tools to deal with the hazards inherent to the construction and operation of the dam
structures, particularly in providing a framework to minimize the impacts in the
downstream valley resulting from a possible incident or dam failure.
Though Emergency Planning in Portuguese dams has been foreseen since 1990, after
2007 an increased attention was given by the different Dam Safety stakeholders for the
need to prepare, update and implement EAP´s, within the establishment of revised
regulations.
Under the current legislation, the Portuguese Dam Safety Regulator has been attributed
the competence to approve the EAP´s elaborated by the Dam Owners (currently named
Planos de Emergência Internos - PEI) after obtaining advice from ANPC. ANPC also has
the role to elaborate the Planos de Emergência Externos - PEE, which cover the emergency
planning downstream the Dam Owner´s responsibility zone.
In this paper we will address the PEI/Dam Owner context when referring to EAP´s,
which in Portugal are mandatory for Class I (high consequence) dams.
We will approach the progress observed in the submission of the EAP´s occurred in
recent years, together with its implementation (currently in a start-up phase), giving a
perspective over the pertaining legislation and guidelines, and sharing some of the matters
dealt with by the Dam Safety Regulator, Civil Protection Structure, Dam Owners and Dam
Safety Consultants.

2 LEGISLATION AND GUIDELINES

The main Portuguese Dam Safety legislation relating to Emergency Preparedness and
EAP´s, is Decree Law 2007/344 that establishes the Portuguese Regulations for the Safety
of Dams, commonly known as “RSB1”.
The current RSB1 is applicable to the following types of dams:
 H ≥ 15m;
 H ≥ 10 m and V > 1.000.000 m³;
 15 m < H and V > 100.000m³;
 High consequence (Class I) dams.
For emergency purposes, RSB1 considers the separation of the dam´s downstream valley
into two main zones where the responsibilities for early warning and emergency
management are clearly identified.
Under this zone definition, the Dam Owner is responsible to issue alert messages to the
Civil Protection entities and deliver early warnings to the population in the emergency area
closer to the dam referred to as “Zona de Autosalvamento” or ZAS, this being considered
an area where the Civil Protection may not have the time to issue the emergency warnings.
In general terms, however, the Civil Protection structure is broadly responsible for the
emergency management in the downstream valley.
In addition to the zoning areas, RSB1states that the overall Emergency Preparedness
Planning is based upon two documents, namely the PEI´s (“Internal” Emergency Plans)
focusing on the ZAS, whose elaboration is a Dam Owner´s responsibility, and PEE´s (
“External” Emergency Plans) focusing on the valley downstream the ZAS, a specific Civil
Protection Structure responsibility.
Although in some particular cases (such as the occurrence of incidents), the Dam Safety
Regulator may enforce the implementation of emergency measures, Emergency Planning
as per RSB1 is only due to Class I – high consequence dams. It is therefore a crucial setting

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point for the need to elaborate an EAP, the determination of the dam´s class of
consequences.
In RSB1, dams are classified under a potential consequence base, mainly considering
the downstream valley occupation, according to the following criteria:
 CLASS I: Residents ≥ 25
 CLASS II: Residents < 25, or existing important infra-structures, specific
environment areas, installations for the production or storage of hazardous
substances
 CLASS III: Other dams
Chapter III of RSB1 specifically addresses to Civil Protection measures to be considered
in the Dam Safety context, consisting in a body of nine articles, spanning from emergency
zoning to definition of the EAP´s.
After the publication of a revised RSB1 in 2007, ANPC and the Dam Safety Regulator
jointly produced a set of guidelines to support the elaboration of the EAP´s.
These guidelines are gathered in a document entitled CADERNO
PROCIV 52 (Guidelines for Developing Emergency Action Plans in Dams), published in
June 2009, which present, in a detailed form, the contents and organization to be considered
in the elaboration of an EAP.
Furthermore, in October 2011 a complementary set of guidelines was jointly published
by ANPC, LNEC and the Dam Safety Regulator, specifically designed for the
implementation of exercises in the EAP´s context - CADERNO PROCIV 173 (Guidelines
for Developing Exercises on Emergency Action Plans in Dams).

3 RECENT EVOLUTION IN EAP SUBMISSIONS

The first years following the approval of the RSB1 in 2007 may be considered a
transition period where the dam owners, together with their appointed consultants, had to
perform an adapting stage to a number of new dam safety procedures.
The evolution observed in EAP´s submission was influenced by the different levels of
technical knowledge of the dam owners and respective consultants and availability of
financial support required to carry out the EAP related studies and implementation of the
approved solutions.
As in other countries, in Portugal, hydropower dam owners generally prove to be more
technical and financially prepared to deal with the alterations introduced in dam safety
regulations.
Among the issues raised by the new legislation, many financial difficulties were
detected in a number of dam owners at an early stage, and several public or state controlled
entities were no exception to this problem. This matter has been partially dealt with by
assigning state funding or by allocating EU funds to dam safety. Around 2012, the initial
“adaptive period” was partially stabilized, and whilst at that time a short number of EAP´s
have been approved, a more significant number of these documents have been submitted.
This situation raised the need to promote a number of discussions with the different EAP
actors to clarify doubts and pending matters, with a view to improve the performance of
the EAP process.
The image below summarizes the evolution of the EAP´s approved and under evaluation
in Portugal from early 2012 to late 2017. More recently, a trend has been noted towards
the stabilization of the submitted documents to the Dam Safety Regulator, and by
December 2017, 55 EAP´s were under evaluation and 34 have been approved.

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Figure 1: Evolution in Emergency Action Plans (2012-2017).

Furthermore, 12 EAP´s have been implemented to date. Many of these had to do with
hydropower or water supply structures, though an important effort has been recently made
in the agriculture sector.

4 EVALUATING EMERGENCY ACTION PLANS

In broad terms, initial stages of the EAP elaboration may be triggered through two main
approaches: whether the EAP is part of the project of a new dam or it is produced over an
existing dam, many times with a history of many decades in operation.
In the first case, the process tends to be simpler, as the EAP becomes part of an overall
new dam project where, among other aspects, an updated dam break assessment and the
inundation maps resulting from the dam failure are also presented.
For older structures, together with the EAP document, it is many times necessary to
perform some basic dam safety updates, namely to do with the hydrologic information of
the catchment and the hydraulic safety of the dam.
In any case, the Dam safety Regulator has the duty to analyse the inundation maps
resulting from a dam failure as a starting point from where the need for developing specific
EAP´s is checked.
A number of critical design inputs influence the respective dam break flood calculations
as well as the emergency procedures to be established in the following steps. Examples of
matters that have been subject to some levels of discussion during the evaluation process
are the following:
 Selection of the failure modes adopted for the collapse of the structure, namely the
discussion “What is more likely” vs. “What is more damaging”.
 Extension/limits to be considered in the dam-break flood maps. Though this
determination is mainly pertaining to determine the dam´s class of consequences, in
practical/day to day terms, a number of different proposals/criteria arise (i.e. from
the more demanding “water depth vs flow velocity” 1m²/s, through consideration of
a “final section located at the confluence with a larger river”, comparison of the flood
magnitude to the value of a natural flow associated with a certain return period (i.e.
T=100 or T=1000 years).
 Ranges of possible values for the breach characteristics (different consultants may
propose different approaches to the same dam (and some had)).

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 Simplified methods – particular attention need to be taken to the validity of the

method to the specific dam (also noted that, as expected, different methods may
propose substantially different results).
A wider approach to be considered within the elaboration of inundation maps, shall
contemplate the determination of the flooded areas downstream the dam resulting from the
occurrence of a natural flood. This principle is contemplated in the CADERNO PROCIV 52
Guidelines where the flood map corresponding to a river flow with the return period
considered in the design of the dam spillway is to be produced under the EAP context.
This matter has been cause to some controversy, as the determination of inundation
maps is regulated in the Directive 2007/60/EC on the assessment and management of flood
risks, and an ongoing discussion proceeds about the contexts and applicability of the
elaboration, by the dam owner, of the natural flood inundation maps. Nevertheless, the role
of dams and reservoirs in regulating the river flows is always a relevant point to be taken
under consideration, and the current RSB1 enables the Dam Safety Regulator to request for
these documents when considered adequate.
Another issue of the flood mapping elaboration is the transboundary nature of this
matter. Recent EAP´s covering international river courses have been subject to particular
attention in this regard.
After agreement has been reached over the dam break flood calculations and
corresponding flood maps, a consequence based classification is checked against the
pertaining information over the downstream occupation and confirmation of the need for
an EAP elaboration is established.
The information contained in an EAP submitted under the Portuguese legislation
addresses the following items:
 Identification of the dam owner and the technical staff responsible for EAP
 General description of the dam
 Plan for dam monitoring and safety control
 Characterisation of the downstream valley of the dam
 Identification of accident scenarios
 Modelling of the chosen accidents scenarios
 Characterization of the “worst-case” scenario
 Procedures for assessment and classification of accidents
 Identification of procedures in case of accident
 Human and technical resources - Alert to Civil Protection structure
 Human and technical resources - Early warning of the population
 EAP exercises and public awareness procedures
A critical information contained within the dam break flood maps has to do with the
definition of the ZAS emergency area where the early warning of the population is a Dam
Owner´s responsibility. Over this matter, it should be highlighted that a number of practical
adjustments have been introduced in several documents under the EAP´s evaluation
process. A clear example of this procedure has to do with the proposed extension of the
standard designated ZAS area. This extensions have been suggested by the Dam Safety
Regulator (and agreed with several dam owners) when relevant occupation of the flood
area is found relatively close to proposed downstream limit of the ZAS (downstream limit
section of the dam break flood wave corresponding to 30 minutes with a minimum
extension of 5 Km - CADERNO PROCIV 52 Guidelines).
ZAS definition might however stand as the least difficulty. As the number of submitted
EAP´s rise, mutual interference is observed and the complexity of their evaluation might
unfold. In many cases, superimposition of calculated dam break flood waves occurs,
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sometimes added by the partial superimposition of the corresponding ZAS areas. If under
this scenario we will have to consider a cascade of dam break events, then we may be
confronted with some severe difficulties. In any case, from the Dam Safety Regulator point
of view, it just might not be timely and costly feasible to build an integrating digital model
for every new EAP that has been submitted. So under the current status we need to adopt
a practical approach and try to define acceptable procedures and simplifications.
In Portugal, there is an important number of large and class I dams that, within the same
river, belong to the same owner. This fact in itself is due to introduce a level of
simplification, particularly when considering that a critical aspect of an emergency
occurrence are the communications between the dam owner (where the incident occurs)
and the occupants of the downstream valley.
Under these conditions (same river, same dam owner, several dams), specific
considerations may take place. One example of this procedure has to do with the evaluation
of dam break flood maps in pumped storage dam cascades. A distinctive feature in this
type of developments has to do with the typical abrupt difference of dam heights between
the downstream dam, usually associated with a smaller pumped reservoir, and the upstream
dam, which generally stands together with the main storage reservoir.
The difference found between the two dam heights (and respective reservoirs capacity),
together with the relatively short distance between their location, poses the problem of the
abnormal height of upstream dam break flood wave in the downstream dam.
In this cases, the consideration of interconnected EAP´s and respective early warning
systems from both dams may be accepted, subject to the compliance of several conditions,
including, as referred, dams from the same dam owner as well as easy access to bottom
outlets and spillway gates remote control units. This principle, may generally apply (with
the adequate specific adjustments) to any development managed by a single dam owner,
where an abrupt difference of dam heights may occur (i.e. downstream dams with an
upstream outflow regulation function).
Nevertheless, it must be acknowledged that, in general and for time being, EAP´s
evaluation is mainly made considering the downstream effect of each dam break flood,
though consideration of each dam´s specific interference from other dam failures must be
also be taken into consideration.
Another emergency issue that has been subject to some level of discussion has to do
with addressing emergency alert levels (as per foreseen in the CADERNO PROCIV 52
Guidelines), to reservoir water levels. This matter is particularly sensitive in dams without
gated spillways, as available options to control the outflow are generally limited.

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Figure 2: Emergency Alert levels (in CADERNO PROCIV 52)

As in many other aspects of EAP elaboration, particular attention has to be given to the
specific characteristics of the dam structure, catchment area and downstream valley when
aproaching this matter. A large reservoir surface area for instance, may indicate a relevant
flood routing capacity which in turn may represent more time for the dam safety team to
evaluate the evolution of any hidrologic event. An oversized freeboard may also represent
more time available to make decisions under emergency conditions.
A simplified approach to this matter that has been used in several cases consists in
associating specific water levels (corresponding to typical spillway outflows) to emergency
alert levels. The chart below details an example of adopted reservoir water levels in
correspondance to emergency alert levels.

Table 1: Proposed Emergency and Reservoir Alert Levels

Though this sort of aproach is likely to simplify the emergency management,

particularly under adverse or remote location conditions, importance of the weather and
river flow forecasts should always be kept in mind. Downstream occupation is also an
important issue to consider when establishing the relevant water levels in each case.

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5 EMERGENCY ACTION PLAN´S IMPLEMENTATION

Though the implementation of the first EAP´s in Portugal date back to more than a
decade ago, it was only more recently that an illustrative number of these plans was put in
place so that some level of experience may be built upon this phase. One general point that
arose during first recent EAP implementations was the need to discuss a number of matters
that have not been considered or were not clear enough from the elaboration phase. These
matters had mainly to do with the following items:
 Procedures to be considered in the public awareness sessions to be promoted by the
Dam Owner (i.e. contacts with national and local authorities, programme of the
information sessions and information to be available to the public)
 Installation of the outdoor siren network (i.e. location practicality, technical features)
 Communications systems (i.e. available mobile phone network in remote areas,
redundancies)
 Aspects of public evacuation in case of emergency (i.e. shelter locations)
Many of the aspects that have to do with EAP implementation have much to do with the
specific conditions of the occupation in the area surrounding the dam, cultural level of the
local population and adaptability of the foreseen technical equipment to local conditions.
An example of a recent discussion that occurred about the installation of an outdoor
siren network had to do with the definition of the operation procedures in connection with
the available technical features: should we have an early warning system prepared to be
automatically activated under certain pre-defined conditions (i.e. reservoir water levels) or
should this action be preceded by authorized technical staff confirmation?
For the time being, it was decided to keep the warning system activation dependent on
a human based final decision.
Example of an information leaflet that has been distributed to the public (Ribeiradio-
Ermida development), is shown below. An agreed template was previously discussed
between APA, ANPC and the Dam Owner (originally a folded A4 size).

Figure 3: Public awareness information leaflet (Page 1) -Ribeiradio-Ermida

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Figure 4: Public awareness information leaflet (Page 2) - (Ribeiradio-Ermida)

This document contains a very brief description of the dam and dam safety monitoring,
ZAS areas, emergency phone numbers, description of the siren warnings, simplified map
highlighting dam´s location and access roads, shelter location and general procedures to be
followed by the public under an emergency occurrence.

Figure 5: Implementation of early warning systems at Veiguinhas, Alto Ceira II and Baixo Sabor dams

6 CONCLUSIONS
Recent Experience obtained in the evaluation and implementation of EAP´s , indicates
that design flexibility, exchange of technical views and the adjusted options are approaches
that help to improve final solutions and increase the level of readiness of the dam´s
operational response.
A careful assessment of the dam’s conditions and of the downstream valley occupation
is of critical importance, and a detailed technical definition of the calculations on the dam
break studies is an important requirement to support an adequate evaluation of the options
to be made in the elaboration of the EAP documents. Nevertheless, it should be highlighted
that it is equally important that emergency procedures and operational documents in
particular should be as straightforward, clear and simple as possible.
The elaboration and implementation of EAP´s in Class I dams implies a considerable
investment from the respective Dam Owners and funding of these activities is a matter that
needs careful addressing. A revision of the current Portuguese Dam Safety legislation has
been recently prepared with the collaboration of the involved stakeholders and these
include alterations that will introduce adjustments in the universe of the dams classified as
Class I, with mandatory implications over the EAP implementation. In any case, whilst

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altering the number dams, the new legislation will not modify substantially the concerns
that have been mentioned in the current paper.
As a result from the experience obtained in the EAP´s evaluation and implementation
process, a document gathering the more Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ´s) was jointly
produced between APA and ANPC with the collaboration of LNEC and is due to be issued
in 2018. These FAQ´s intend to help the dam owners, consultants and others on the phase
of the EAP´s elaboration.
Though dealing with a relatively recent process, the need for continual update has been
noted in several cases, particularly regards to the involved stakeholders contacts,
downstream valley occupation and evolving related legislation.
An additional effort is to be provided in what concerns the accomplishment of exercises
to the EAP´s.

REFERENCES

[1] Regulamento de Segurança de Barragens - Dec. Lei 344/2007, de 15 de Outubro de

2007 - https://www.apambiente.pt/_zdata/GSB/Legislacao/DL344_2007.pdf
[2] CADERNO PROCIV 5 - Guia de Orientação para Elaboração de Planos de Emergência
Internos de Barragens (Guidelines for Developing Emergency Action Plans in Dams) -
http://www.prociv.pt/bk/cadernos/5.pdf
[3] CADERNO PROCIV 17 - Guia para Elaboração de Exercícios aos Planos de
Emergência Internos de Barragens (Guidelines for Developing Exercises on Emergency
Action Plans in Dams) - http://www.prociv.pt/bk/Documents/CTP17.pdf

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