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I'm curious how well this applies to the short-term effects of filling the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam? [1]

As I understand it a lot of the downstream ecological effects rely entirely on the fill rate the Ethiopians choose (3 years, 5 years, 10 years, 15 years, etc). A fast fill rate (5 years or less) could have significant short to medium term effects on the arable land downstream in Sudan and especially Egypt.

The dam is oversized for its power output (to ensure it can meet peak output demands during the wet seasons) and will operate as a fish trap, cutting the number of fish able to head downstream (and ultimately to the sea / mouth of the Nile) by a significant amount.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Ethiopian_Renaissance_Da...



Large dams are a different ball game than the small run of river plants I have worked on and the ones discussed in the article.

Even at large dams it is possible to build fish ladders to allow migration.

When we were filling our head ponds (reservoir) we weren’t allowed to impound more than 10% of the total flow in the river.




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