Fluctuation Effect of Reservoir Water Level on the Seepage of Earth-Fill Dam

Abstract

Lots of dam failures are the result of uncontrolled seepage. The collapse of the Situ Gintung Dam in Tangerang, Banten-Indonesia in 2009 due to heavy rains caused the dam structure to collapse. This is due to increased pore water pressure in the landfill. To anticipate collapse due to uncontrolled seepage, it is necessary to monitor it based on the behavior of changes in rainfall and reservoir water levels. Seepage within the dam body is often monitored using instrumentation tools such as standpipe piezometer (standpipe piezometer) or electric piezometer. But often the piezometer cannot work properly because it is clogged, so it cannot monitor the condition of the seepage. Other instrumentations such as V-Notch are also used to measure seepage discharge. This study aims to determine the behavior of changes in the reservoir water level caused by changes in rainfall and its effect on body seepage of the earth-fill Type dam. By knowing the phenomenon of the behavior of the relationship between reservoir water infiltration and rainfall, it will obtain information on rainfall that endangers the dam which will affect the downstream. In this study, a case study of the Selorejo Dam was taken which has a large enough reservoir capacity of about 31 million m3 which is included in the Brantas River Basin. The results showed that 5 piezometers devices were damaged (SL 1, SL 2, SL 4, SL 6, and SL 7) where they could not read the phreatic water level properly, and 2 piezometers were less sensitive to reading fluctuations in reservoir water levels. namely SL 10 and SL 11 which showed R2 values of 29.78% and 39.4%, respectively. While the maximum seepage discharge is recorded at 1474 liters/minute, this is still below the critical discharge of 1630 liters/minute allowed for this dam, but this needs to be a concern, especially the discharge from toe drain from the left side seepage and C-area which is the leakage from the left support pedestal also contributes a larger discharge than other observation points.