Cairo – “This morning, I received the following message from the Minister of the High Dam… on behalf of the builders of the High Dam who pledged to complete the construction of the High Dam power station on the 18th anniversary of the revolution, in appreciation of their merit in establishing this great project, which would not have been possible without the firm determination to implement it, despite Among the imperialist plots that were hatched to thwart him, I am pleased to inform you that work on the High Dam will be completed perfectly.
With these words, the late Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser announced the end of the High Dam project, which laid its foundation stone on January 9, 1960, after Egypt fought for it the battle to nationalize the Suez Canal in July 1956, and the consequent tripartite military aggression ( England, France and Israel) from which Egypt emerged politically victorious, to move towards completing the dream of building the dam.
Later, the dam became the greatest Egyptian engineering achievement in the modern era, and its position extended politically, socially and economically, but it seems that this position has now declined due to technical factors and others related to huge government projects that President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi says match the status of the High Dam.
The idea of constructing this dam dates back to after the July 1952 revolution, when the Egyptian-Greek engineer Adrian Daninos proposed to lead the revolution a project to construct a huge dam at Aswan to protect villages from the negative effects of the Nile flood, while at the same time storing water and using it to generate electricity. .
Experts have settled on the importance of the project, while the cost of constructing the dam was estimated at 450 million Egyptian pounds, or nearly $1 billion at the time.
Egypt asked the World Bank to finance the project, which decided to provide aid equal to a quarter of the costs of constructing the dam, but due to international pressures, the bank withdrew the financing offer on July 19, 1956, which prompted Nasser to decide to nationalize the Suez Canal.
dam building journey
In December 1958, Egypt signed an agreement with the Soviet Union to lend it 400 million rubles (the Soviet currency) for the implementation of the first phase of the dam.
After 12 months, the dam reservoir water agreement was signed between Egypt and Sudan, and the foundation stone for the High Dam was laid on January 9, 1960. Diversion channel and tunnels were dug and lined with reinforced concrete, poured the foundations of the power station and built the dam to a level of 130 metres.
On August 27, 1960, a second agreement was signed with the Soviet Union to lend Egypt an additional 500 million rubles to finance the second phase of the dam. And in the middle of May 1964, the river’s water was diverted to the diversion channel and tunnels, closing the course of the Nile and starting to store water in the lake.
In October 1967, work began on the power station of the High Dam, and the entire water storage began in front of the dam the following year, and the construction of the dam was completed in mid-July 1970, to be inaugurated on January 15, 1971 during the era of President Anwar Sadat.
The length of the dam is 3600 meters, the width of the base is 980 meters, the width of the summit is 40 meters, and the height is 111 meters. The body of the dam consists of 43 million cubic meters of concrete, iron and other materials.
A water flow of up to 11 thousand cubic meters of water per second can pass through the dam, and behind it the largest artificial lake in the world, with an average length of 500 kilometers and a width of 10 kilometers.
The High Dam also contributed – in addition to generating electricity – to increasing the agricultural area in Egypt from 5.5 to 7.9 million acres, and worked to grow more productive crops and provide water on a regular basis, and its availability was not linked to periods of flood.
declining status
5 decades after the opening of the dam, it seems that its status is no longer the same in terms of electricity generation, as the government believes that it no longer depends on the dam to generate electricity, as it built giant power stations, as well as the trend for renewable energy sources to produce electricity, especially solar energy. .
During the inauguration of a number of new projects affiliated to the electricity sector in the governorates of Upper Egypt on December 27, President Sisi said that the electricity sector witnessed difficult conditions previously, and that the government is currently aiming to put Egypt in the ranks of developed countries with regard to the production of renewable energy, explaining that the government has dealt With electricity problems as if they are national security problems.
Referring to Egypt’s passing of the High Dam stage as the most important engineering project in its modern history, Sisi touched on the huge projects that are currently being built, and said, “Each project that has been completed is comparable to the size of the completion of the construction of the High Dam.”
In May 2016, the Minister of Electricity, Muhammad Shaker, spoke about the development of the electricity network, as evidenced by the ability of the network to continue even if influential elements leave it, which is what happened with the High Dam station. But Shakir declined to provide further details after the president asked him not to speak.
investing in renewable energy
During the inauguration of projects in Upper Egypt at the end of last year, the Minister of Electricity said that the state is interested in investing in renewable energy, such as wind and solar energy, and that Upper Egypt represents about 70% of the country’s total production capacity.
Shaker added that the administrative capital’s power plant with a capacity of 4800 megawatts, operates with air cooling, making it “the largest generating station in the world” with this capacity and technology.
The projects – which Sisi inaugurated – also included the Benban Solar Energy Complex in Aswan Governorate, which the official media describe as “the largest solar power plant in the world.” The Minister of Electricity explained that the plant has a capacity of 1,465 megawatts, and employs about 10,000 workers .
Shaker indicated that the mobile electrical transformer stations contributed to improving the service provided, and mobile transformer stations were purchased within the framework of the plan to improve the service and raise the efficiency of performance, adding that Egypt produced electricity up to 14 times the capacity of the High Dam.
electrical hook
It seems that the huge production of electric energy encouraged the government to export it to neighboring countries, as the Minister of Electricity confirms that his country has implemented a number of electrical interconnection agreements with several countries, including Jordan, and is also implementing a project with Saudi Arabia, which Shaker described as a connection line that can transmit 3,000 megawatts, and this It means one and a half times more energy than the High Dam, according to the minister.
In televised statements, Shaker indicated that there is a great development in the electricity distribution networks, as about 36 billion pounds have been invested in the electricity networks within 4 years.