Age, climate and economic disparities drive the current state of global dam safety
Author(s)
Moreno-Rodenas, Antonio
Mantilla-Jones, Juan Diego
Valero, Daniel
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Dams are essential for flood protection, water resources management, energy generation and storage and food production. However, the consequences of their failure can be catastrophic, as demonstrated by recent examples. Here this study revisits dam failures worldwide since 1900, analysing key factors driving the failure risk, profiling current dam safety and providing an outlook to the near future. Similar to previous analyses (1970s to 2010s), we observe a strong infant mortality, which remains especially important for the development of new embankment dams, while recent concrete dams have become more resilient. In contrast, hazard signals related to ageing remain yet less apparent, contrary to common belief. Nevertheless, given their abundance, we expect decades-old dams to be prevalent in future failure statistics—especially for embankment dams of height between 15 and 70 m built in the second half of the last century. This highlights the relevance of investments in monitoring, maintenance and uprating, which, if ignored, could become a substantial liability and a major vulnerability, especially in the context of increased flooding frequency. We uncover a trend of increased failure rates of newly constructed dams in low-income regions, which coincides with areas where a substantial hydropower potential remains untapped. This is especially intensified in monsoon-dominated climates, whereas the pattern of construction and failures is more homogeneous across other major climatic regions. Our statistical analysis suggests that 23 (95% confidence interval 14–33) large dam failures are to be expected worldwide in the near future (2023–2035), with currently ~4.4% of large dams having a probability of failure larger than 1/10,000. Contrarily, 85% of large dams are at least twice as safe as this threshold, commonly embraced in policy. These findings can support the targeted allocation of limited resources for the future-proofing of infrastructure, thereby contributing to water, food and energy security.
Date Issued
2025-03-01
Date Acceptance
2025-02-06
Citation
Nature Water, 2025, 3 (3), pp.284-295
ISSN
2731-6084
Publisher
Nature Research
Start Page
284
End Page
295
Journal / Book Title
Nature Water
Volume
3
Issue
3
Copyright Statement
© The Author(s) 2025 Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
License URL
Publication Status
Published
Date Publish Online
2025-03-07