Whether you’re road-tripping or just love learning more about structures and interesting engineering designs, dams impact millions of people and can be visited to provide an inside look into how they work and what they do for us. At MAS Building and Bridge, we offer dam and marine construction with a dedicated staff working effectively with the utmost attention to quality, safety and environmental sensitivity required for such projects. Here are the four most modernized dams in North America.
The 4 Most Modernized Dams In North America
The 4 Most Modernized Dams In North America
Hoover Dam
Built between 1931 and 1935, the Hoover Dam holds back the Colorado River and straddles the border between Arizona and Nevada. Once the tallest dam in the country, and the second tallest today, the Hoover Dam was the most expensive engineering project in the nation at the time, with Art-Deco detailing made from concrete.
Grand Coulee Dam
Starting dam construction in 1933, the Grand Coulee Dam was built in 1942 outside of Spokane, Washington. The dam creates 21 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity annually, producing the most hydroelectric power of any dam in the United States. Grand Coulee Dam was the key to the development of power on the Columbia River — the greatest potential source of hydroelectric energy in the country.
Oroville Dam
Dedicated in 1968, seven years after starting the dam construction project, the Oroville Dam stops up the Lake Oroville Reservoir, which offers drinking water, water-based recreation and hydroelectric power while mitigating flood damage. The Oroville Dam, located in Feather River, California, has been the country’s tallest dam for more than 50 years, rising at 770 feet tall.
Theodore Roosevelt Dam
Once the largest masonry dam in the world, located in Phoenix, Arizona is the Theodore Roosevelt Dam. Originally constructed between 1905 and 1911, the goal of the dam was to halt the wayward flow of the Salt River to irrigate the Arizona desert, therefore making it more accommodating to farming. However, in 1996 the dam underwent a $430 million renovation, masking the masonry with concrete.
Dams are awe-inspiring and provide irrigation, hydropower generation, water supply and flood prevention. MAS Building and Bridge has the essential knowledge and experience to successfully complete complex dam or coastal marine construction by using cofferdams to take on a wide range of projects in Massachusetts. Contact us today to learn more about our dam and coastal marine projects!