Autor: Ljupcho PETKOVSKI, PhD, CEng, Prof.
ABSTRACT
This year we celebrate a significant jubilee – 80 years of dam engineering in Republic of Macedonia. Planning, design, construction and maintenance of dams are among the most responsible civil engineering works. The first dam in R. Macedonia, arch dam Matka, at the canyon of Treska River, near the city of Skopje, was built in 1938. Construction of this dam and its appurtenant structures marks the beginning of dam engineering in Republic of Macedonia. At present, in 2018, we can proudly state that dam constructors in R. Macedonia are worthy heirs and prolongers of the noble work of the first dam designers, dating to 1938. Confirmation of such statement is the fact that 45 dams with regional importance and over 110 embankment dams with local importance are the key pillar of the present water economy infrastructure. Republic of Macedonia is located in the central part of the Balkan Peninsula, and it covers an area of 25,713 km2 with a population of about 2.1 million. With over 150 built dams of basically all types (embankment and concrete dams, gravity and arch dams) categorized as “large dams” by ICOLD criteria, Republic of Macedonia, proportionally to its size, is located right at the top of dam engineering in Europe.
