Ethiopia has begun generating electricity at its new 5,000-MW roller-compacted concrete gravity-type dam on the Nile River. The first 375 MW went to the national grid on Feb. 20.
Because of its sensitive location near the Prime Minister’s office, this river improvement and public greenspace project in the Ethiopian capital had to forgo typical stone blasting in favor of specialized large-scale earth blasting and excavation to remove 210,000 cu m of stone to develop key areas of the park.
The contract involves the construction, with financing from Italy’s credit agency Servizi Assicuative de Commerce Estero, of the 2,200-MW Koysha Dam on the Omo River in the southern part of the country.
French engineering, design and project management firm Artelia has been picked to replace Deltares—an independent Dutch institute for applied research in water and subsurface—in a contract to study the impact of the $4 billion Great Ethiopia Renaissance Dam (GERD) on the flow of the Nile River.
Construction of a new $1.55-billion, 550-kilometer multiproduct fuel pipeline linking landlocked Ethiopia and coastal Djibouti is set to commence next year.
Investigating safety concerns posed by the $4.8-billion Grand Renaissance Dam in Ethiopia, a joint committee comprising representatives from Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan, among others, recently made its last trip to the hydropower-plant site before compiling its report.
The Ethiopia-Kenya Power Systems Interconnection Project—the first phase of eastern Africa’s $1.3-billion power integration initiative—is set for takeoff after the World Bank approved $684 million in construction funds for the project in June, even as global environmental groups step up pressure to halt the work.
