Flood Management Strategy for the Upper and Middle Odra River Basin: Feasibility Study of Raciborz Reservoir

The river Odra, which rises in the Czech Republic and disgorges into the Baltic, suffered an extreme flood in July 1997 which was responsible for the loss of 55 lives and over a billion dollars worth of damage in southern Poland. The return period of the flood is variously estimated between 250 and 1000 years. The paper describes the hydrological and hydraulic studies undertaken for a flood reservoir (storage capacity is approximately 180,000,000 m3) to be constructed on the River Odra just upstream the ancient town of Raciborz, on the border between Poland and Czech Republic. These studies included the hydrodynamic modelling of a 220 km stretch of the river down to the city of Wroclaw where most of the damage occurred, flood damage analysis with and without the proposed reservoir, sensitivity analysis of operating rules for Nysa reservoirs and improvement of flood control capacity of existing channels and polders. Cost-benefits analysis, environmental impact assessments and resettlement plans, in addition to the engineering studies of the dam itself, were also carried out during the project stage but have not been included in the present paper.