Africa | African snapshots
Mega dam projects in Ethiopia and small dam failures in Sudan are featured in this snapshot of the African hydropower and dams industry
ALTHOUGH DESCRIBED AS BEING the backbone of Africa’s electricity supply, there is still huge untapped hydropower potential across the continent. In fact, as the International Hydropower Association acknowledges, at 90%, Africa has the largest proportion of unexploited capacity in the world. With the 2GW of hydropower capacity installed
increasing the region’s total to 42GW in 2023, the IHA says Africa still lags far behind what’s needed to meet energy goals. Numerous regulatory and market issues are slowing down any development and creating a backlog of projects, leading to delays and even cancellation.
Below: The availability of free water at the Um Dafoug Dam has led to numerous adverse impacts, triggering a significant increase in the population of livestock, the proliferation of poaching activities, localised environmental degradation and soil erosion due to overgrazing in the vicinity of the dam
One of the major ongoing water conflicts in Africa focuses on the Eastern Nile River Basin where a decade of negotiation and mediation has been unsuccessful. The longest continental river on Earth, the Nile travels through 11 countries and runs through diverse climatic, topographic, environmental, and socio- economical landscapes. As Heggy et al explain in their research published in Communications Earth and Environment, this unique hydrological and environmental system is an essential freshwater resource, especially for downstream riparian countries such as Egypt and parts of Sudan. Precipitation patterns have been changing over the Nile River Basin since the 1900s, leading to consistent decreases in the average annual natural river flow, even before the era of mega dam building began. However, the construction and operation of such dams since the 1960s have caused disputes and brought global attention to water allocation and management issues in the basin. Since Ethiopian authorities started building the 16,000GWh Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) on the Blue Nile in 2011, the Blue Nile River
Basin countries of Egypt, Sudan, and Ethiopia, have been negotiating on its filling and operation due to the hydraulic uncertainties associated with prolonged droughts.
Heggy et al claim their research provides
comprehensive assessments of the efficiency of multiple drought-mitigation policies for the impact of dam operation. Their results suggest almost optimal hydropower can be generated without a noticeable downstream deficit during wet, average, and temporary drought flow conditions. For prolonged drought, an ideal operation policy has been identified which allows GERD to generate a sustainable 87% of its optimal hydropower without creating additional downstream water deficit. Furthermore, the authors provide four intermediate policies demonstrating enhanced upstream hydropower generation while minimising dam- induced downstream water deficits. “Our findings attempt to bridge the negotiation disparities in the Nile hydropower mega-dam operations during prolonged drought and foster an actionable and collaborative framework,” they say. The hydro-political context surrounding the GERD project is described as being complex and multifaceted, involving a range of historical, geopolitical, economic, and environmental factors and negotiations. The authors say their study provides a path forward to resolve the scientific disparities between the Nile River Basin countries and strive towards a win-win collaborative framework. However, they do caution that the GERD operation may have benefits or adverse effects on Sudanese dams, which were not part of this study need to be simulated and studied separately.
Small Sudanese dams Small dams in Sudan are often constructed as earthen
embankments with controlled or uncontrolled spillways, storing seasonal runoff from Wadis, with capacities ranging from 1-10Mm3
. Despite
their importance, in his research published in the International Journal of Water Resources and Environmental Engineering, Hamid Omer Ali says many small dams face technical and management challenges that undermine their sustainability. With more than 100 of these dams across the country, as of 2023, approximately 30% of them are reported as being non-functional. Technical challenges, insufficient maintenance, inadequate management, and climate change effects have led to numerous physical failures in these small dams over the past decades. This is demonstrated in the North Darfur State where 10 out of 33 small dams have experienced partial or complete failures. The main reasons behind these were attributed to: A lack of proper operation and maintenance practices.
12 | May 2025 |
www.waterpowermagazine.com
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