Over the three days, our stand welcomed a large number of industry professionals. Visitors included engineering consultancies, developers and asset owners, universities and research centres, and equipment and materials manufacturers.

Our hydraulics laboratory in north-west Spain attracted the most interest. Videos of our scale model tests led to technical discussions on the hydraulic behaviour of spillways, stilling basins and other structures, as well as many enquiries about our modelling services. Diego López, from our engineering team, explained to visitors the added value of combining physical and numerical modelling.

Martín Martínez presented the paper “Methods of hydraulic simulation in spillways and their comparison: Physical and CFD models”. The paper treats CFD and physical modelling as complementary stages of a single design and validation process. Each technique brings its own strengths: the flexibility and level of detail of numerical analysis, and the reliability of physical testing for complex phenomena such as air entrainment, energy dissipation and three-dimensional flow.

Jorge Núñez and Álvaro Sánchez attended on behalf of AIN ACTIVE OM, which expanded its network of partners and gained first-hand insight into the latest technologies for the operation and maintenance of hydropower plants.

We would like to thank everyone who visited us for their time and interest. We look forward to continuing the conversation and to seeing you at the next edition.

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AIN active SLU has expanded the facilities devoted to its hydraulics laboratory to accommodate new contracts for reduced dam models, not only for the Spanish market, but also for the American continent.

This week a new inspection visit was carried out to the 1:50 scale model by the engineering team and the owner of this dam. The dam is a concrete arch‑gravity structure with a central arch of approximately 200 metres radius and a crest length of more than 300 metres, characterised by a central spillway and lateral spillways. The main spillway has a fixed crest, with two central bays separated by a central pier and a Bradley‑type profile, while the lateral spillway also has two fixed‑crest bays with a crest level higher than that of the central spillway. The dam also includes two bottom outlets and two mid‑level outlets, and the flow is returned to the river channel through a stilling basin.

The experimental process requires calibration of the model, in our case always cross‑checked against numerical models. The objectives of this model include verifying freeboards and flow velocities during a flood through the spillway, assessing the performance of the bottom outlets, and checking the hydraulic jump downstream of the stilling basin and its impact on the river banks.

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