Managing a dam

Queensland’s referable dam owners must be committed to dam safety, with an effective dam safety management program that incorporates a culture of dam safety. It needs to be delivered through day-to-day operations, to both minimise the risk of a dam failing and to protect life and property.

Referable dams may have safety conditions applied to them by the Department of Regional Development, Manufacturing and Water. Dam safety conditions state minimum dam safety management obligations for you, as the dam owner, and may include:

  • what records must be kept about the dam and when they must be provided to us
  • developing and implementing an operation and maintenance manual for when engineering inspections of the dam must occur
  • when safety reviews must occur
  • what to do when the dam experiences a deficiency, incident or failure.

The Queensland dam safety management guideline (PDF, 1.3MB) provides examples of dam safety conditions that might be applied to a dam and describes elements of an effective dam safety management program.

If you own a rural and small irrigation dam, find information specific to you in the Small dam safety handbook (PDF, 5.1MB).