ERBIL, Kurdistan Region- Stalled for years due to the financial crisis that hit the Kurdistan Region in 2014, work has re-started on the construction of eleven small dams across the region. The completed dams will be able to store up to 59 million cubic meters of water.
“Work has restarted on one of the dams fully, but due to the current weather, work is yet to start on the others, but preparations are made for them,” Akram Ahmed, director general of Dams and Water Reserves in Kurdistan Regional Government’s (KRG) Ministry of Agriculture and Water Sources, told Rudaw.
He added that they intend to re-start work on the rest of the dams by March, when the weather is expected to improve.
Five of the 11 dams (Chamargah, Aqouban, Shawger, Banuy Talaban, and Nazanin) are located in Erbil. Three dams (Xins, Sibnah 2, and Gali Bandawah) are in Duhok, and three (Dewanah, Tourajar, and Xornawazan) are in Sulaimani.
The KRG has planned projects to build 17 additional dams, but due to the financial crisis that started in 2014 and the austerity measures that ensued, money stopped flowing into the projects.
According to official letter number 9392 on November 6, 2019, the Prime Minister of the KRG directed KRG’s Ministry of Finance and Economy to allocate 33.3 billion dinars (roughly $27.9 million) to complete eleven dams that have stalled since 2014.
The KRG, in a report detailing its accomplishments after 100 days in office, highlighted its allocation of the 33.3 billion dinars for 12 dams, but did not specify the names of the dams being funded. The Directorate of Dams and Water has only indicated renewed construction on the 11 dams previously mentioned.
Despite the allocation of the money, some contractors fear that they won’t be paid on time.
“There is a section in the Prime Minister’s letter that stipulates the money will be allocated in batches upon availability of hard cash. This has resulted in uncertainty among contractors because they fear spending their money and then not getting paid by the government,” Twana Ismael Qadir, a supervisor working on the Aqoubanah Dam project in Erbil’s Shaqlawa, told Rudaw.
The Kurdistan Region has many rivers, some of which originate in neighboring Iran and Turkey. According to experts, nearly 50 billion cubic meters of water pass through the Region annually.
According to these experts, however, more than 85% of the water passing through the Region is not stored by dams or otherwise used.
“There are 17 dams and 100 ponds in the Kurdistan Region for storing water,” stated Ahmed.
The Directorate General of Dams and Water Reserves was established in 2007, and Ahmed told Rudaw that they have built 12 dams so far: Awa Sipi, Bedohy, Bawashaswar, Chami Simor, Degala, Hamamok, Hashaziny, Hassan Kanoush, Jali, Kodala, Shiwaswr, and Qadir Kara. These 12 projects cost the KRG 96.5 billion Iraqi dinars (roughly $80 million).
The cumulative storing capacity of these 12 dams is more than 72.5 million cubic meters of water, with the capacity to irrigate 16,290 dunams of agricultural land. One dunam is equal to 2,500 square meters.
The 11 dams on which work is set to re-start are all in different stages of completion. Ahmed told Rudaw that the dam projects range from 20% to 90% completed.
Ahmed also told Rudaw that upon the completion of the dam projects, Kurdistan Region’s water reserving capacity would increase by 59 million cubic meters of water, and that the dams would decrease the threat of flooding and irrigate up to 27,3000 dunams of land.
“The impact of the financial crisis on the dams has not ended yet, as work on the Basarah, Bawanour, Surqashan, Chaq Chaq and Zalan dams, which cumulatively need 500 billion dinars ($410.4 million) hasn’t re-started yet,” added Ahmed.
However, Professor Azad Jalal Shareef, a water expert in the Geography Department of Salahadin University in Erbil, downplayed the significance of the dams as “small projects” having little economic impact, highlighting the importance of big dams for water security in the land-locked Kurdistan Region.
“Turkey and Iran are busy building dams on the rivers flowing into the Kurdistan Region. If Kurdistan doesn’t undertake urgent steps to create big and strategic dams for storing the water of the rivers, then in case of a drought, the water security of the Kurdistan Region will be endangered,” Professor Shareed told Rudaw.
The Kurdistan Region has only three big and strategic dams: the Dukan, Darbandikhan and Duhok dams. All three were built by the Iraqi government in the 20th century. Two of the dams are located on the vital Great Zab and Little Zab rivers. The three dams collectively store more than 10 billion cubic meters of water.
Bekhma Dam was supposed to be the largest and most strategically significant of the dam projects in the region, but it was never completed.
34% of the dam was completed by 1991, but following the 1991 Uprising in the Kurdistan Region, the ouster of Iraqi government from Kurdish areas, and the subsequent looting and pillaging of the project’s equipment and materials that was in its early stages, the project was abandoned. It is located 60 kilometers north of Erbil on the Great Zab River.
If Bekhma Dam is ever completed, it will be the largest in Iraq, and it will play a key role in flood control, irrigation, and the production of hydroelectric power.
However, disagreements between the KRG and the Iraqi Federal Government, fears of villages being submerged and other political disagreements have prevented the completion of what is perceived by some to be a vital water security project for Iraq and the Kurdistan Region.
“We don’t have the completion of Bekhma Dam in our projects, but we have plans to build 200 dams, some of whose designs have been completed, but we don’t have the funds,” added Ahmed.
According to Ahmed, the completion of Bekhma Dam requires $10 billion, and due to the project being a matter of Iraqi sovereignty, the Iraqi government should bear the cost of building it.
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