Atualização da cheia de projeto e o seu impacto na probabilidade de falha por deslizamento da barragem. Estudo de Caso: UHE Santa Clara.

Abstract

Climatic changes that may be affecting the behavior of precipitations, making them more intense, have been observed in several parts of the world. Brazil, having a vast number of dams, may be one of the countries strongly impacted by these changes. Risk assessment, in this context, is essential to assess whether existing dams and those that will be built meet safety criteria, or whether they need reinforcement or an increase in their discharge capacity. In risk analysis, it is necessary to employ probabilistic methods to consider the great variability of the parameters involved and quantify the uncertainties that are disregarded by deterministic methods. In this dissertation, a case study of Santa Clara HPP was carried out to analyze if there were changes in the project flows and the impact that these variations can cause at the probability of failure of the dam. The maximum flows determined at the time of the construction of the dam were compared with the flows found then updating the hydrological studies. In view of the results, it was possible to verify that there was an increase in flow rates. The Monte Carlo Method was used to establish a curve correlating the affluent flow with the failure probability, allowing to calculate, for all return times, the failure probability by sliding.