Dam building and sabre-rattling: when the Ethiopian government announced it was going to proceed with building a giant dam on the Nile, alarm bells started ringing in Cairo. A storm in a tea-cup or the gathering war clouds over the vital resource that is water?
IT IS CALLED THE GRAND ETHIOPIAN Renaissance Dam. It is the most ambitious hydro-electric dam project yet undertaken in Africa, with a price tag of a mammoth $4.8 billion. At full capacity it will generate and supply 6,000MW, and make Ethiopia the biggest power producer in Africa. It will be able to feed the East Africa Power Pool and its exports should satisfy all of Ethiopia's regional neighbours' electricity demand, at least until the end of this century. There is just one problem--Egypt has grave concerns over the dam's impact on its crucial Nile waters.Ethiopia has embarked on a number of hydro-electric dams, seeing their development as providing a solution to its energy requirements by using one of the country's most obvious natural assets, its high elevation and the plentiful supply of rivers that feed into the Blue Nile, one of the two major tributaries of Africa's longest river, the mighty Nile. Ethiopia aims to produce 15,000MW of power within eight years as part of a plan to spend $12 billion over the next 20 years to overcome chronic power shortages and export to other African nations. Currently, there are 14 hydro-electric dams in the country.
Further dams are also planned, as well as the controversial Gibe III, in the Lower Omo valley. Gibe III is now almost completed, and that dam has the potential to generate 1870MW when it finally comes fully on line. The last construction update suggested it may become operational this month (July).
This dam was controversial because it displaced many indigenous people, its footprint endangered rare flora and fauna and it was feared that the water levels of Lake Turkana in northern Kenya would be adversely impacted. So controversial was it, in fact, that both the World Bank and the African Development Bank withdrew their financial backing in 2010. It went ahead anyway, with Chinese assistance and the marketing of treasury bonds to the Ethiopian diaspora.
But concerns over the new Renaissance dam project have taken on a truly international dimension with Egypt's President Mohamed Morsi taking a tough line over the development. He is on record as saying in early June that "all options are open" to deal with any threat to his country's water supply posed by an Ethiopian dam. Morsi said that he does not seek war but threatened action if the Nile waters were disrupted. Ethiopia's Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn responded by vowing "nothing" and "no one" will stop the dam's construction. He added that he believed Egypt's leaders won't go to war unless they "go mad".
It would seem that Egypt was surprised by Ethiopia's decision to begin diverting the Blue Nile in order to prepare for the next stage in the construction of the dam.
A high-level ministerial mission was despatched from Cairo for talks with the Addis Ababa government, but details are sketchy as to whether any progress was made on defusing the tensions over the Nile waters. Some observers have suggested that Morsi's motive for raising the issue in such a provocative manner may have been to serve as a diversion from the country's socio-economic problems.
Yet others have suggested that Ethiopia's government felt that Egypt's government would be so troubled by domestic matters, it would be able to proceed with the dam's construction without scrutiny.
Whatever the truth of the matter, things were not helped when various Egyptian military figures were inadvertently filmed discussing the possibility of an air strike against the dam, or backing Ethiopian rebel groups to destabilise the government and/or conduct sabotage against the dam's site.
The Renaissance Dam is expected to be completed (with the necessary grid infrastructure) by 2018. Situated just 40km from the Sudan border, it might be thought the Sudanese government would also be opposed to the dam's construction, but they have not expressed any concerns.
The problem seems to be that to fill the reservoir behind the dam will abstract a sizeable amount of water from the flow of the Blue Nile. Some analysts speculate that the flow will decrease by a quarter due to the effect of filling the reservoir.
The vast majority of Egyptians live along the Nile Delta and need the Nile's water and the sediments it carries that fertilise the land for millions of Egyptian farmers.
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| Title Annotation: | Egypt/Ethiopia |
|---|---|
| Author: | Assiout, Salim |
| Publication: | New African |
| Geographic Code: | 6ETHI |
| Date: | Jul 1, 2013 |
| Words: | 717 |
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