Ethiopia has completed about 70% of the construction of the largest hydroelectric dam in Africa, the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), and the entire project is expected to be fully completed in 2023, according to the Ethiopian News Agency (ENA).
ENA said that members of the Permanent Committee for Natural Resources, Irrigation, and Energy in the Ethiopian parliament have visited the project listened to explanations from Kifle Horo, the general manager of the project about progress in constructions.
Horo stated that the committee in charge of turbine units nine and ten will be generating energy before finishing the entire project. The two turbines are planned to generate 750 megawatt (MW) of electricity by 2021.
He further added that Ethiopia has spent ETB 99 bn ($31bn) on the project which still needs an additional ETB 40 bn to be completed.
Ethiopia started construction of the GERD in April 2011, despite Egypt’s concerns that the construction of the dam could negatively affect its historic Nile water share of 55 bn square metres, which it has had access to since the historic 1959 agreement between Egypt and Sudan.
Meanwhile, water ministers of Egypt, Ethiopia, and Sudan have met on Sunday and Monday in Khartoum, Sudan, in the third tripartite meeting of the new course of negotiations to address the disputed points between the three countries on the GERD. They did not reach an agreement but vowed to continue discussions.
