The British Dam Society
Caring for dams, people and the environment

Conferences

A BDS conference has been held once every two years since 1982. The conferences have formed some of the most successful events of BDS with more than 150 participants at recent conferences. They are normally held at a University campus to keep costs low and have generally taken place over two and half days with one afternoon being used for a visits to dams. Conference proceedings has been published by Thomas Telford since 1990 and are available from the ICE Bookshop.

A summary of BDS conferences is given below. Links from the (recent) conference locations go to individual conference websites which contain copies of paper abstracts. Full (scanned) copies of earlier conference proceedings are currently available for all conferences up to and including the Bath 2000 conference.

BDS Conferences and Proceedings

Back to topBibliography of BDS Conference Papers

The British Dam Society commissioned Paul Tedd to write short summaries of all papers published in the proceedings of the 14 BDS Conferences from 1975 to 2006. Summaries for papers of seven of the Conferences Proceedings have now been completed and are on the BDS website here. They are in the form of an Excel Spreadsheet. They complement the Bibliography of British Dams on the website. Inevitably some errors will have occurred in the preparation of these summaries. Anyone finding errors should contact Paul Tedd at tedd@ukf.net and suitable amendments will be made.

View BDS Conference Paper Summaries

Back to topGeoffrey Binnie Lecture

This is the premier lecture of BDS and was formerly known as the BNCOLD lecture. It was renamed as the "Geoffrey Binnie Lecture" as it was endowed by Binnie and Partners. The lecture is presented at the BDS conference. The choice of lecturer is the responsibility of the Main Committee.

BNCOLD lecturers

1984 NJ Cochrane Insidious threats to dams and reservoirs
1986 FG Johnson Experience with the concrete dams of the North of Scotland Hydro Electric Board
1988 DJ Coats The concerns of a dam engineer

Geoffrey Binnie lecturers

1990 PA Back The ultimate dam
1992 W Pircher 36000 large dams ? and still more needed
1994 MF Kennard Four decades of development of British embankment dams
1996 TPC van Robbroeck Reservoirs - Bane or boon
1998 JA Charles The lives of embankment dams - Construction to old age.
2000 TA Johnston Taken for granted
2002 GP Sims The challenge for british dam engineers
2004 RE Coxon Matters related to adverse incidents associated with dams and the role of Review-Boards
2006 CJA Binnie Dams, responding to society's needs
2008 W Carlyle The Binnie heritage in dam engineering
2010 J Cowie Hydropower and Panel Engineers – a lasting legacy