Tripartite meetings on Ethiopian dam start in Cairo

Meetings of a tripartite national committee kicked off in Cairo Wednesday with all its 12 experts from Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia present to probe technical offers made by two international consultancy offices regarding the impact of the Renaissance Dam on the downstream countries.

Meetings over three days will be attended by representatives of the two consultancy offices - the French BRL Group and the Dutch Deltares - which submitted an amended technical study under both their names.

This is the sixth such round of meetings that aim to finalize contracts with the two companies before implementation of the studies starts.

The Renaissance Dam is a gravity dam on the Blue Nile River in Ethiopia currently under construction.

It is located about 15 kilometers east of the border with Sudan.

At 6,000 megawatts, the dam will be the largest hydroelectric power plant in Africa when completed, as well as the 11th largest in the world sharing the spot with the Krasnoyarsk Dam.

The storage reservoir holds a large volume of water equal to 79 billion cubic meters.

Ethiopia denies that the dam will have a negative impact on water flows to Egypt.

Egypt fears a temporary reduction of water availability due to the filling of the dam and a permanent reduction because of evaporation from the reservoir.

The reservoir volume is about equivalent to the annual flow of the Nile at the Sudanese-Egyptian border.

This loss to downstream countries would most likely be spread over several years. Reportedly during the filling of the reservoir 11 to 19 billion cubic meters of water per year could be lost, which would cause two million farmers to lose their income during the period of filling the reservoir.

The Renaissance Dam could also lead to a permanent lowering of the water level in Lake Nasser, if floods are stored instead in Ethiopia. This would reduce the current evaporation of more than 10 billion cubic meter per year, but it would also reduce the ability of the Aswan High Dam to produce hydropower to the tune of a 100 MW loss of generating capacity for a 3 m reduction of the water level.