TEHRAN – Iranian Energy Minister Reza Ardakanian said 10 major dams are going to be inaugurated in nine provinces across the country by the end of the current Iranian calendar year (March 19, 2020).

As reported by Tasnim news agency on Sunday, Ardakanian noted that with these dams starting operation, over 26,000 hectares of land will be supplied with water using modern irrigation systems.

According to the official, construction of new dams will also lead to boosting the country’s hydro power generation capacity.

As reported by the portal of Iran’s Energy Ministry (known as Paven), currently 17 hydroelectric power plants with a total capacity of 3,800 MW are under construction across the country, which, once completed, will generate an average of 7,700 gigawatt hour (GWh) electricity on an annual basis.

There are currently 178 major dams operating across the country behind which nearly 41 billion cubic meters of water is stored.

Iran’s current power generation capacity stands at about 85 GW of which the share of hydroelectric power plants stands at nearly 20 percent.

Currently, 54 hydroelectric power plants with a total capacity of over 12000 megawatts are operating in Iran, with an average annual output of about 6,000 GWh.

The increase in the country’s hydroelectric output comes as heavy rainfalls in spring almost filled all the dams across the country.

According to the data provided by Iran Water Resources Management Company (WRMC), during the 11-month period in Iran’s current hydrological year (Sep. 2018- July 2019), 69 percent of the country’s dams were filled.

Last year, the volume of water behind the country’s dams went so down that electricity output from hydropower plants fell to a decade low. 

The current water year, however, kicked off with great amount of rainfalls across the country which even caused some floods in northern and eastern provinces.

EF/MA