The Grand Renaissance Dam Water Diplomacy Mechanisms Applied on the River Nile Trans-boundary Conflict

15 
 
2.1- The Nile River Basin and the GERD 
The Nile is a 6,695 Km long river and is considered the longest in the world. The river crosses 
11 riparian states: Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Kenya, Egypt, 
Ethiopia, Rwanda, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, and Eritrea
26
. 
The Blue Nile‟s total length is 1640 Km of which 900 Km is in Ethiopia and 740 Km is in 
Sudan. The source of the river is from the largest lake in Ethiopia - Lake Tana - and its 
drainage area amounts to 329,530   
 
 
27
. The GERD is located close to the border with 
Sudan in the Benishangul-Gumuz region and is considered as Africa‟s largest hydro-electric 
power plant with a storage volume corresponding to around 1.5 years of the mean discharges 
of the blue Nile
28
. The reservoir area of the dam is 1,874 Km
2
 and it has a total storage volume 
of 63 billion cubic meters of water of which 59.2 billion cubic meters will discharge water to 
the turbines. The dam wall is 145 meters high and 1,708 meters wide and the project includes 
a rock fill saddle dam and gated spill way south of the main dam. The turbines can generate 
6,000 Mega Watt of electricity and 15,692 Giga Watt hours of energy per year
29
. 
The project is being executed by Salini Impregilo (currently known as Webuild): an Italian 
based firm that was hired to carry out the construction of the GERD. They were contracted for 
the project on a closed bidding just before the first foundation stone was laid in 2011. Apart 
from the GERD, they were hired for the works of Gibe I (2004), Gibe II (2010) and Gibe III
30
. 
The technical documentation of the GERD has been kept highly secretive and none of the 
official documents have been available to the public.  
The first report was published in 2013 (after the authorization by the Ethiopian government to 
access technical documents) and was finalized by Panel of Experts (“IPoE Final Report”). The 
report was authorized by the Ethiopian government to assure Egypt and Sudan that the GERD 
                                                           
26
 Wirtschafter J. (2019), U.S.-led talks lead to breakthrough as African rivals inch closer to war over Nile.  
Available online: https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/nov/11/steven-mnuchin-mediated-talks-see-grand-ethiopian-/ 
27
 UNESCO (2008), Sediment in the Nile River System, Khartoum, Sudan. Available online at: 
http://www.irtces.org/isi/isi_document/Sediment%20in%20the%20Nile%20River%20System.pdf  
 
28
 Wikipedia (2022), „Aswan Dam‟. Available online: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aswan_Dam 
 
29
 International Panel of Experts – IpoE – (2013), Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam Project (GERDP), Final Report. Addis 
Ababa, Ethiopia 
 
30
 Grcheva I. (2016), Water Urbanism in Transboundary Regions: The Nile Basin and the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam. 
Ku Leuven, Faculteit Ingnieutswetenschappen. Available online: 
https://transboundarywaters.science.oregonstate.edu/sites/transboundarywaters.science.oregonstate.edu/files/Publications/Mas
ter%20Thesis%20KU%20Leuven%20Irina%20Grcheva.pdf
16 
 
does not constitute any harm to the respective water security of both countries.  The outcomes 
of the “IPoE Final Report” can be summarized by the fact that the “Hydrological and 
Reservoir Simulation Study” does not present a precise plan for the filling of the reservoir that 
would potentially reduce the flow by 6% on the Egyptian High Aswan Dam. Furthermore, it 
lacks research about the sedimentation that would be trapped by the GERD and that is 
considered of great importance for the Sudanese agriculture. Furthermore, there is no 
mentioning of the relationship between the GERD and rosaries dams in Sudan. Furthermore, 
the report concluded that, from a hydrological point of view, there was a focus only on the 
GERD without taking into account upstream developments and without featuring downstream 
flow records and hydro-meteorological information. Such information would, in turn, be 
needed to assess the downstream impact of the GERD. 
Additionally, it is important to mention here that the “Socio-Environmental Assessment 
Study” for the construction of the GERD has never been publicly released. Such a study is 
considered crucial in the decision and negotiation processes. As a matter of fact, the 
introduction of such a document would be considered as a revolutionary step in the direction 
of a sustainable dam building planning. 
2.2- The GERD from an Egyptian Perspective 
The ancient Egyptians considered the Nile to be a gift from the gods
31
. In fact, every year the 
Nile flooded the lands leaving behind a fertile soil for agricultural cultivation. To increase the 
arable land and the annual crop to two crops per year, the basin irrigation system was further 
complemented with building of “longitudinal dike along the eastern side of the river that 
enlarged the flood area. Much later, during the Roman era, perennial irrigation was introduced 
with the invention of the Shaduf
32
.  
Agriculture was administered at a local level in the ancient times and it was under the control 
of villages‟ chiefs who, in turn, were administered by higher public figures. Such a 
hierarchical line continued till reaching up to the Pharaoh.  
                                                           
31
 Tignor, Robert L. (2010), Egypt: A Short History. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press 
32
 Said, R. (1993), The River Nile: Geology, Hydrology and Utilization. Pergamon Press. Oxford, UK
17 
 
The irrigation system in Egypt remained the same for many years after and was mainly based 
on basin irrigation systems, dykes, „shadufs‟, and „saqias‟. However during the Ottoman and 
British Empires in the 19
th
 century large transformation occurred. In fact, during the rule of 
Mohamed Ali the cotton industry and its commercialization in Europe were developing which 
induced the construction of first barricades on the basin to increase the irrigated land as well as 
to minimize the floods. Afterwards, during the rule of the British Empire in Egypt (1882-
1952) first reservoirs, dams, and large canals were built.  
In the 1960s and during the rule of Jamal Abdel Nasser the High Aswan Dam (referred to 
afterwards as HAD) was built and in the 1970s its first reservoir named as Lake Nasser was 
realized. The dam was constructed to reduce the impact of the Nile‟s erratic flow and maintain 
a degree of security over the water resources.   
The construction of the dam and the lake has had, of course, a major impact on preventing 
floods as well as an opportunity to generate electricity. In fact the dam powers twelve 
generators with a total of 2.1 Giga watts. By 1998 the dam provided the opportunity to supply 
certain Egyptian villages by power for the first time. Currently, the annual flow of the Nile at 
the AHD is around 84.5 BCM though the reservoir has a holding capacity estimated between 
156 BCM and 169 BCM
33
. 
From a historical point of view it is important to emphasize that Egypt has been, in the last 
century, benefiting from a hydro-hegemony on the Nile as a result of colonial agreements 
during the British Empire. In fact, in 1902 the control of the British Empire on Egypt and 
Sudan (which was part of Egypt at the time) and the strategic importance of Egypt had 
resulted in pushing Ethiopia to sign a deal committing not to undertake any projects on the 
river that would have any influence on Egypt‟s water share that amounted to 84 Km3 which, 
in turn, corresponded to the whole amount of the Nile water flow
34
. A further historical 
milestone is represented by the 1929 agreement that allocated 48 KM3 of annual water to 
                                                           
33
 Emad, E.; et al. (2015), Modeling High Aswan Dam Reservoir Morphology Using Remote Sensing to Reduce Evaporation. 
International Journal of Geosciences 5:156 
34
 Younes H. (2022), Kaif Bada Sad al Nahda? Mashadda Bayn Omar Suleiman wa Melis Zinawi alla ti ash’alat al Harb fi 
Wadi al Nil. Translation by Nicola Hazboun: “How the Grand Renaissance Dam started? A heated discussion between Omar 
Suleiman and Melis Zinawi that triggered war in the Nile Basin?”. Aljazeera Arabic. Available online: 
https://www.aljazeera.net/midan/reality/politics/2021/7/10/%D8%B3%D8%AF-
%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%86%D9%87%D8%B6%D8%A9-
%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A5%D8%AB%D9%8A%D9%88%D8%A8%D9%8A-
%D8%AA%D9%86%D9%85%D9%8A%D8%A9-%D8%A8%D8%B7%D8%B9%D9%85
18 
 
Egypt, and 4 KM3 to Sudan while 32 KM3 remained un-allocated. The same agreement has 
also resulted in a commitment by Sudan to secure a regular water flow to Egypt.  
In the following years, Egypt had not faced water problems until 1956 when Sudan obtained 
its independence from Britain and started claiming its rights and oppose the Egyptian 
development of hydro electrical projects on the Nile by building HAD and without being able 
to build similar projects within the Sudanese territories. Those disagreements between Egypt 
and Sudan resulted in signing an agreement in 1959 that re-allocated the water shares between 
the two countries with the total exclusion of Ethiopia from the agreement. The year 1993 
represented a turning point in which the Egyptian President at the time, Hosni Mubarak, 
signed a deal with the Ethiopian President Meles Zenawi
35
. The 1993 agreement between the 
riparian countries constituted a framework within which the agreed-on principles encouraged 
to build a fruitful collaboration between the two countries while respecting reciprocal water 
rights and the rule of law and without causing any harm to any of the riparian.  
However, this agreement did not last long due to the Egyptian insistence to refuse any 
development projects that could be built on the river and the situation became even more 
complicated in 1995 due to the attempt assassination of President Mubarak in Addis Ababa 
that resulted by Cairo cutting diplomatic ties.   
2.3- The GERD from an Ethiopian Perspective  
Ethiopia never recognized the 1959 agreement
36
. The announcement in 2011 (during the 
Egyptian Arab Spring protests) of building the GERD represented a major political challenge 
to the de facto Egyptian hegemony over the Nile river and demonstrated clearly the political 
will of Ethiopia to build the GERD even in absence of a comprehensive basin agreement. The 
opposing argument of Ethiopia was always based on the fact that the agreements were put in a 
colonial era which did not give the upstream countries their right of water shares in addition to 
the possibility of realizing development projects. In its tentative to reverse this de facto, 
Ethiopia also managed to attract other upstream riparian countries to renegotiate new 
agreements regarding their water shares which resulted in signing the Nile Basin Initiative 
“NBI” in 1999. The general framework of the initiative was built upon a common organization 
                                                           
35
 Lawson F. (2016), Desecuritization, Domestic Struggles, and Egypt’s Conflict with Ethiopia over the Nile River. 
Democracy and Security:Volume 12 Issue 1 
36
 Vitalis N., et al. (2021), The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, Egyptian National Security, and Human and Food 
Security in the Nile River Basin. Cogent Social Sciences
19 
 
through which it organizes a shared vision and collaboration on the water rights of the Nile 
basin. The initiative constituted a first founding agreement of the water legal rights and the 
right to realize development projects. However, this agreement faded after a decade as it 
continuously resulted as a space of conflict between the respective ministers on the water 
rights and the range of rights for each one to develop its own development projects. The 
initiative was substituted by an agreement in 2010 where Ethiopia and 5 riparian countries 
signed in Entebbe an agreement with the aim of ending the Egyptian and Sudanese hegemony 
on the water rights of the Nile. Egypt, on the other hand, had refused to ratify the agreement. 
Accordingly, Ethiopia had moved individually in claiming its rights of the Nile and announced 
the construction of the GERD: the biggest hydroelectric project and the 10
th
 largest one in the 
world. The construction of this project falls within Ethiopia‟s “Growth and Transformation 
Plan 2010/11-14-15” – a strategy that envisions the transformation of Ethiopia from a low to 
middle income country by 2025. The plan focuses on increasing the energy production and 
advancing the agricultural sector.  
On the other hand, Ethiopia currently is one of the most underdeveloped energy infrastructures 
in the world. With low production of energy and a growing demand per year it would be 
difficult for Ethiopia to meet domestic demand and economic growth in addition to industrial 
development
37
. Therefore, Ethiopia has put hydropower as an essential part of its strategy for 
economic and industrial growth and the GERD (with its potential power generation capacity 
of 15.692 GWh) is the pillar for this development. In fact, the power generated from the 
GERD and other dams in Ethiopia could prospectively gain Ethiopia around one billion 
dollars only from the export of power to neighboring countries. Currently, the energy coverage 
in Ethiopia is 41% and only around 20% of the population has access to electricity
38
. On the 
other hand, 95% of the current energy of Ethiopia comes from biomass, 4% from fossil fuels 
and 1% electrical energy. Mostly, urban areas are the ones supplied with electricity whereas 
                                                           
37
 FDRE, MoFED, Growth and Transformation Plan 2010/2011-2014/2015 (2010). Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Available online: 
http://www.mofed.gov.et/English/Resources/Documents/GTP%20English2.pdf 
 
38
 VERHOEVEN, H. (2011), Black Gold for Blue Gold? Sudan’s Oil, Ethiopia’s Water and Regional Integratioin. Arica 
Program, Chatham House
20 
 
the rural areas depend on burnt wood and waste for energy mainly for cooking and heating. 
This results in depleting the forest industry sector and air pollution
39
 
While exploiting the hydro power resources in Ethiopia is a key matter, yet there are available 
unexploited resources of energy such as geothermal energy, wind, and sun. 
As far as the funding of the project is concerned, the GERD is mainly funded by Ethiopian 
domestic national funds as Ethiopia has not managed to secure international funds. The total 
cost of the project is 3.377 Billion Euros which are mainly collected from donations and 
funds. 
Although the dam is self financed by the Ethiopian population, the country has serious 
problems with hunger and malnutrition. One of the main reasons of this food insecurity is the 
underdeveloped means for agricultural production that remains highly dependent on the 
summer rains, labor, and animals.     
2.4- The GERD and the Source of Tension 
With the construction of its GERD, Ethiopia emphasized that the project will not harm Egypt 
and confirms that it is only claiming its right to use one of its natural resources for the 
economic development of the country and that this intention is being done under the 
international law of equitable use of trans-boundary water. Egypt, on the other hand, disagrees 
on the fact that the GERD will not be harmful and also claims its water acquired rights under 
international agreements
40
. The main point of tension includes a water security aspect 
associated with the amount and volume of water to be stored in the reservoir and the 
determination of the filling period that is estimated to be between 5 to 7 years and how to 
define the filling process during drought and severe drought periods (IPOE, 2013). As a matter 
of fact, the reservoir filling inevitably reduces the flow and can potentially impact the 
downstream users of water.  
The downstream users which will be affected are the Rosaries dam which is important for 
irrigation and the production of energy in Sudan, the Sennar dam which is important for 
                                                           
39
 Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (2010), „Growth and Transformation Plan  2010/11-14-15‟. 
Available online: https://faolex.fao.org/docs/pdf/eth144893.pdf 
40
 Maru Taddele M. (2020), The Emergence of Another African Conflict: Egypt, Ethiopia, and Geopolitics of the Renaissance 
Dam. Aljazeera Centre for Studies. Available online: https://studies.aljazeera.net/en/reports/emergence-another-african-
conflict-egypt-ethiopia-and-geopolitics-renaissance-dam
21 
 
irrigation on the Blue Nile, the Merowe dam which is important for the production of energy 
in Sudan, and for the High Aswan Dam (HAD) on the Nile in Egypt. All of these dams have 
reservoirs and are correlated in terms of water flow and irrigation as well as energy networks 
In particular, as far as the Egyptian HAD is concerned, it is estimated that during the filling of 
the GERD‟s reservoir the water supply will be reduced by 6% which will have an impact on 
the amount of water, on power generation and vegetation due to the change of water supply 
patterns, and on water quality in addition to the increase of the level of salt that is currently 
being washed out due to the excess of the available water in the reservoir which, in turn, 
prevents the deposits of salt in irrigation systems and soils (IPOE, 2013). In fact, it is 
presumed that the filling of the reservoir would accelerate the siltation process which could 
have potential consequences on the agricultural sector of Egypt on which the livelihood of a 
huge population segment depends.  
On the other hand, there are some benefits of the project on the basin eco system synthesized 
by 50% electricity increase for Ethiopia and an amount of water saved from evaporation in 
addition to benefits related to the reduction of sedimentation and the creation of a stable flow 
which, in turn, and knowing that it is a flood based system, will benefit mainly Sudanese 
agriculture by reducing severity floods (Taddele, 2020). 
The mentioned sources of tension between riparian countries shall also be viewed in the 
function of some macro trends in the area. As a matter of fact, Bitsue and Kiros in their paper 
affirm that “The population of eastern African countries, which includes almost all riparian 
countries, will grow to constitute almost half of Africa‟s. This population growth will put 
pressure on water, food, energy, and commodities consumption. At the same time, according 
to a World Bank report Egypt already needs 25% more of water in comparison to what it 
currently gets
41
.  
In a 2013 “AlJazeera Inside Story” coverage on the GERD an Egyptian farmer - Mr. Fathy 
Abdel Hay - was interviewed and explained that, previously, he used to irrigate his lands from 
the water canals of the Nile which suddenly stopped due to clogging in the river‟s canal. Since 
then Mr. Hay has used pumps to obtain water from the Nile. Furthermore Mr. Hay explained 
that “the construction of the GERD will definitely affect Egypt as it will affect the 
                                                           
41
 Partners to NBI. Available online: http://siteresources.worldbank.org/EXTWAT/Resources/4602122-
1213366294492/5106220-1234469721549/33.1_River_Basin_Management.pdf