Africa’s Largest Hydropower Dam Sparks A Power Surge

The long-awaited Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) has finally opened in Ethiopia’s Benishangul-Gumuz region after nearly 14 years of construction. 

It is now the biggest hydropower dam in Africa. 

Situated on the Blue Nile—a tributary of the Nile River— the $5 billion dam reached a capacity of 5,150 megawatts (MW) on Tuesday, a new high on the continent’s power landscape.

At its peak, GERD, which is located 700 km northwest of the capital Addis Ababa, near the border between Ethiopia and Sudan, will generate 6,500MW, doubling Ethiopia’s power output.

With this capacity, GERD — whose waters plunge 170 metres — now ranks among the world’s 20 largest hydroelectric dams, generating 25% of the output of China’s Three Gorges Dam.

At the launch in Guba on Tuesday, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said the dam would increase access to electricity for millions and allow surplus power to be exported.

“To our brothers: Ethiopia built the dam to prosper, to electrify the entire region, and to change the history of black people,” Abiy said, addressing critics in Sudan and Egypt.

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Construction of GERD began in April 2011, led by Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation, which hired Italian contractor Webuild to place roller-compacted concrete (RCC).

This concrete mix speeds up building and cuts costs and emissions compared to traditional concrete.

According to the contractor, the project involved building a 170 m high main gravity dam in RCC, with two hydroelectric power stations installed at the base of the dam, and a secondary dam in loose materials (rockfill) with a concrete facing 5 km long. 

The hydroelectric power stations are located on the right and left banks of the river and consist of 13 Francis turbines, with an installed capacity of 5,150 MW, equivalent to three medium-sized nuclear power plants.

“The [dam] is 1,800 m long, 170 m high and with a total RCC volume of 10.7 million m³. The reservoir has a surface area of 1,875 km² and a volume of 74 billion m³,” the company said.

“The project has created a reservoir that collects rainwater and river water and channels it to the main dam; the average annual outflow is estimated at around 50 billion m³ of water.”

The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam has been a controversial project for more than a decade. The dispute centres on water sharing between Ethiopia, Egypt, and Sudan.

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