Senate Institutions hears DEC request to cover Waterbury Dam inspection overruns as Army Corps share is renegotiated

DEC officials told the Senate Institutions committee on Feb. 6 that they are requesting a $150,000 capital budget adjustment to complete inspection, testing and necessary repairs on the tunnel and penstock systems at Waterbury Dam, a high-hazard state-owned facility. "We're requesting a $150,000 to be able to complete that project," the DEC section chief said, describing cost overruns that occurred after drought and winter weather delayed works and forced extra safety and de-icing measures.

The department said the tunnel is a 14-foot-wide, 11-foot-tall concrete arch feeding three steel penstocks (one 54-inch, one 40-inch) that convey water under the dam. The penstock inspections discovered unexpected conditions and welding issues that required additional confined-space entries, welding tests and safety measures, officials said, extending the schedule and increasing costs. DEC staff also said they temporarily used funds from an instrumentation design line and now seek to restore that money as part of the adjustment request.

Why it matters: Waterbury Dam is a high-hazard facility, DEC officials said, with an inundation boundary that places roughly 5,000 people and about 1,400 structures at risk in worst-case modeling and estimated dam-failure damages in the hundreds of millions of dollars. "This dam provides roughly $4,000,000 in flood damage prevented annually," the section chief said, underlining the public-safety rationale for timely repair and inspection work.

Spillway reconstruction and federal cost share: DEC described a separate but related multi-component spillway reconstruction project being developed with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Emily Bird, the Water and Baths and Fishing Director, said updated engineering work lowered the project estimate from about $92 million to $76 million. Bird credited the congressional delegation, singling out Senator Sanders, for helping secure a more favorable cost-share arrangement with the Corps and said the Corps currently has $40 million appropriated for the project.

Bird told the committee DEC is pressing to raise an authorization ceiling (cited in the presentation as $60 million) to $80 million so the Corps can obligate more funding; under the $80 million ceiling DEC estimated the additional state match needed would be about $1 million beyond funds already secured. DEC reported $4.5 million in state cash fund support already committed; officials emphasized that if the federal authorization and appropriation are not lifted, the state could face a substantially larger funding gap.

Schedule and construction impacts: DEC said design work is continuing and that construction is currently planned for about 2028–2030, pending funding and final cost refinements. The project will replace or rehabilitate spillway gates, stabilize downstream toe aprons, replace the maintenance bridge and perform large-scale concrete repairs to address alkali-silica (transcribed as "alkali sulfur") reaction damage. Construction will require a significant temporary access road and a reservoir drawdown estimated at roughly 30 to 50 feet for about two years, DEC said, which will reduce recreational access during the work but is intended to preserve flood protection performance during construction.

Operational safety incident and near-term repairs: During routine inspection staff found Gate 3's brake system was unreliable; the gate was taken out of service and closed, and DEC activated a nonemergency level of the emergency action plan to notify downstream communities. A $20,000 replacement and installation was completed, testing confirmed the repair, and the EAP notice was deactivated, the department said.

Staffing and procurement changes: DEC described its program staffing growth (from two staff in 2017 to seven currently, with two vacancies it hopes to fill) and proposed a multi-year engineering retainer contract to prequalify consultants and reduce repeated RFP cycles. Officials said the retainer would speed project starts and reduce back-end contract negotiation time for future dam projects.

Questions from committee members focused on hydropower impacts and the role of the private power operator. Committee members asked whether drawing the reservoir down for construction would reduce the hydropower plant’s head and revenues and whether the power producer could seek compensation. DEC said the hydropower operator (named in the presentation as Green Mountain Power) negotiated long-standing water-right arrangements dating to the original project and that the operator has planned outages and maintenance in coordination with DEC; DEC said detailed impacts on generation will require further analysis as project designs mature.

Next steps: The department asked the committee to support the $150,000 capital adjustment to complete the penstock/tunnel work and to consider the broader funding needs for the spillway reconstruction as authorization and appropriation discussions continue with the congressional delegation. No formal vote was recorded on the floor of the committee during the presentation.