ABSTRACT
Cenza dam (Spain) is a 49 m above foundation high dam with a total volume of 224,000 m3 and 205,000 m3 of a unique type of RCC. The design of the Cenza dam as a roller compacted concrete solution started on July 1990. The first stage of the trial block was built in the summer of 1991 and the second in the summer of 1992 together with the dam excavation. The RCC placement in the dam started on 29th March 1993 and was completed the 14th August of that same year. Since then the dam has behaved properly although there were some leakage after first filling. The upstream face was repaired in the summer 1995 and some zones of the foundation were also grouted. These works have helped to reduce leakage to minimum values. The paper describes each of the dam phases and their features. Some of the design and construction aspects that might have had some influence on the initial permeability of Cenza dam are discussed in this paper. This analysis reviews and comes to conclusions about subjects as the RCC mix design, the treatments on horizontal joints, the construction of the waterstops on the upstream face, the perimetric gallery, etc., also taking into account the development of the RCC technology during the last ten years.
