Abstract: Establishing proper evaluation indexes and criterion and making accurate judgment on dam’s operational risk according to the real operation condition is important for operation management in water conservancy projects. However, complex fuzzy, nonlinear relations exist between the evaluation indexes and criterion. Set pair analysis method has priority in quantitatively dealing with uncertainty problems between multifactors, hence it can be used for the evaluation of dam’s operational risk. An assessment model for dam’s operational risk based on entropy theory and set pair analysis theory was built. The index weights were determined through calculation of information provided by each factor. The model was applied to evaluate the operation risk of a dam, and the safety level of the dam was obtained and the development trend of the risk was predicted. Results showed that the present method based on set pair analysis and entropy theory is simple and feasible, scientific and reasonable, and offers new idea for the assessment of dam’s operation risk.

Key words: dam, operation safety, risk assessment, information entropy, set pair analysis