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14-537: If built, the 57 m high concrete gravity dam will be one of the largest hydropower plants in the country, with an installed electric capacity of 93 MW and an expected annual generation of 322 GWh. The dam and its associated power station will be built on the upper course of the Drina River , in the municipality of Foča , about 12 km upstream the town of the same name, in Republika Srpska . The site

28-535: A cooperation with Serbia , which committed in July 2019 to invest €153.5 million in several hydropower projects including Buk Bijela. The project has been under harsh scrutiny of local and national communities and various NGO's from Bosnia and Herzegovina , Montenegro and abroad, due which is postponed and could eventually be abandoned. This project was a matter of inter-state agreement between Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro . It would certainly destroy one of

42-467: A total capacity of 224 MW, annual power generation of 871 GWh and an overall cost of €390 million. The project is being developed by Elektroprivreda Republike Srpske (ERS) , to which the Republika Srpska government has granted a 50 year concession . As of 2018, the estimated cost of the project was close to €200 million. Construction could last 5 or 6 years. A first project for the site

56-564: Is just 10 km from the border with Montenegro , and 21 km downstream the existing 360 MW Mratinje dam , built on a headwater of the Drina. Buk Bijela HPP is part of a broader plan to use the hydropower potential of the Drina river and its tributary Sutjeska river , the Upper Drina hydropower project , that also includes three smaller plants (44 MW Foča, 43 MW Paunci, and 44 MW Sutjeska), for

70-474: Is that their large concrete structures are susceptible to destabilising uplift pressures relative to the surrounding soil. Uplift pressures can be reduced by internal and foundation drainage systems. During construction, the exothermic curing of concrete can generate large amounts of heat. The poorly-conductive concrete then traps this heat in the dam structure for decades, expanding the plastic concrete and leaving it susceptible to cracking while cooling. It

84-406: Is the designer's task to ensure this does not occur. Gravity dams are built by first cutting away a large part of the land in one section of a river, allowing water to fill the space and be stored. Once the land has been cut away, the soil has to be tested to make sure it can support the weight of the dam and the water. It is important to make sure the soil will not erode over time, which would allow

98-485: The current one, with an installed capacity of 450 MW. In May 2019, Banja Luka District Court cancelled the environmental permit for Buk Bijela HPP, ruling on a complaint filed by CEE Bankwatch Network . Despite this decision, Republic Srpska's Prime Minister Radovan Višković stated in January 2020 that the official start of preparatory works would soon be announced. Project implementation could be accelerated thanks to

112-607: The dam can begin. Usually gravity dams are built out of a strong material such as concrete or stone blocks, and are built into a triangular shape to provide the most support. The most common classification of gravity dams is by the materials composing the structure: Composite dams are a combination of concrete and embankment dams . Construction materials of composite dams are the same used for concrete and embankment dams. Gravity dams can be classified by plan (shape): Gravity dams can be classified with respect to their structural height: Gravity dams are built to withstand some of

126-415: The foundation. Gravity dams are designed so that each section of the dam is stable and independent of any other dam section. Gravity dams generally require stiff rock foundations of high bearing strength (slightly weathered to fresh), although in rare cases, they have been built on soil. Stability of the dam primarily arises from the range of normal force angles viably generated by the foundation. Also,

140-483: The last remaining and most important habitats of Danube salmon ( Hucho hucho) in the world, along with the magnificent canyon of the Tara River , which is why this project encountered major opposition in both countries. Gravity dam A gravity dam is a dam constructed from concrete or stone masonry and designed to hold back water by using only the weight of the material and its resistance against

154-412: The stiff nature of a gravity dam structure endures differential foundation settlement poorly, as it can crack the dam structure. The main advantage to gravity dams over embankments is the scour -resistance of concrete, which protects against damage from minor over-topping flows. Unexpected large over-topping flows are still a problem, as they can scour dam foundations. A disadvantage of gravity dams

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168-489: The strongest earthquakes . Even though the foundation of a gravity dam is built to support the weight of the dam and all the water, it is quite flexible in that it absorbs a large amount of energy and sends it into the Earth's crust. It needs to be able to absorb the energy from an earthquake because, if the dam were to break, it would send a mass amount of water rushing downstream and destroy everything in its way. Earthquakes are

182-499: The water to cut a way around or under the dam. Sometimes the soil is sufficient to achieve these goals; however, other times it requires conditioning by adding support rocks which will bolster the weight of the dam and water. There are three different tests that can be done to determine the foundation's support strength: the Westergaard, Eulerian, and Lagrangian approaches. Once the foundation is suitable to build on, construction of

196-559: Was presented in 1974, in order to address the persistent electric shortfall in fastly-growing Yugoslavia . In 1975, the public electric utility company Elektroprivreda Bosne i Hercegovine submitted a $ 70 million loan demand to the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development , to help finance the $ 242.5 million project. It should be emphasized that the Buk Bijela hydropower project was at that time much larger than

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