The Tekeze Hydroelectric Power Generation plant has been waiting for water for about a year now to start feeding power to the national grid.

Rabel (Gishe Rabel), a small town with a population of about 6,000 and located  375Km north of Addis Abeba, has never had electricity in its more than 73 years history. Throughout its existence, the only time it has had electric power was from 2005 to 2008 when a diesel generator its residents bought was functioning properly before it became defunct.
 

Thus, residents of the town, which is also the seat of the Gishe Woreda (district) Administration in North Shoa Zone of Amhara Regional State, like those in the rest of the 10 kebeles of the woreda, have been eagerly waiting for the Rural Electrification Project under the 10-year Universal Electricity Access Programme (UEAP) that the Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation (EEPCo) launched in 2005, to reach their village.
 

For more than two years now, from the time they had heard that Gishe Woreda had been included in the project, they have constantly been in contact with officials of the power utility in Addis Abeba to urge the latter to bring the promised electricity to the woreda.    
 

"We have gone to Addis Abeba about five times in the past two years to talk to officials at EEPCo about the status of our woreda's electrification," Zbene Mandefro, chief administrator of the woreda told Fortune.
 

However, they have not had any form of electricity so far, according to Kifetew Kebede, head of Rabel Town Municipality.  
 

When approached by a delegation from Gishe Woreda, which included representatives from Rabel town, officials at the state monopoly cited reasons for the delay, including the difficult terrain of the woreda and the distance of the area from the nearest transmission line of the national grid, which hindered them from undertaking the work; the nearest grid is in Shoa Robit, one of the 24 woredas in North Shoa Zone. It is about 213Km from Rabel.
 

The population of Rabel included, the 61, 551 people in the 72,000Sqkm wide Gishe Woreda, perhaps, would have been happier if they had had electric power supplied to their house even every other day, like has now become the case in other parts of rural and urban Ethiopia which now already have access to electricity.
 

In these places with access to electricity, from the nearest to Rabel (Shoa Robit) to those very distant (such as Jijjiga town of Somali Regional State) every other day, the residents have now to go through the same kind of experience that residents of Rabel have been through each day for about 70 years.
 

EEPCo introduced a once every two days blackout about a week ago when electrical engineers and officials at the state utility, as well as energy authorities in the government realized that the original power shedding plan would not enable them to maintain the meagre supply to consumers until the next rainy season boosts it, if everything turns out the way they expect it.
 

At the heart of the problem, however, is the 130Mw and 67Mw power deficit during peak and normal working hours, respectively, that officials of the corporation said they have to handle by cutting power through a shift system. However, the frequency of no-power-days in a week has now increased to every other day for more than 14 hours; this is against the original plan of load shedding for six days a month and 14 hours of the affected days to last for a period of three months, as was publicly announced on April 3, 2009.
 

EEPCo had been prepared for an emergency case of such severity, according Miheret Debebe, chief executive officer of the corporation. It had planned to rent diesel generators with a capacity of 120Mw for about six months since December 2008, using finances from the Ethiopian government and the World Bank. It, however, has only managed to install half the number of generators as the financing from the latter source has been significantly delayed and has not yet been secured due to bureaucratic tape, according to Miheret.  
 

The generators obtained, with a combined 60Mw capacity, have been installed in Adama (Nazaret) and Bishoftu (Debre Zeit) towns, 99Km and 47Km east of Addis Abeba, respectively. They were brought into the country at a cost of more than 500 million Br for the rental fee and for the diesel consumption. This, according to the CEO, includes the about 0.15 dollars per kilowatt per hour subsidy the government pays for the power obtained from the rented generators. The subsidy is the difference between the local cost of power as sold by EEPCo and the charge by the owners of the generators.  

This will be reversed under two conditions: the availability of abundant rain in the next few months, as forecasted, or the commissioning of the Tekeze Hydro Power Generation plant, whose construction was finalized nearly a year ago now; and the near completion of Gilgel Gibe II - a hydro power project whose construction was impossible without overcoming tremendous natural challenges.
 

For the next few months, however, the power supply in Ethiopia will depend on the volume of water in the seven dams already operational.        
 

The level of water in these dams has reached such a critical level that the chief of the power utility receives hourly and daily reports on the state of the dams and the volume of water they hold. 

"This is a professional way of following up the situation," Miheret told Fortune pointing to the one-page-for-each-dam graphic report of the water level; the graph has red and black lines with the former indicating the lowest level the waters in the dams could be while the latter indicates the actual size of the water in the dams as of the time of the report.

Ready for operation, Gilgel Gibe II’s Switch Yard is just one part of the mega power generation station on the final miles to commissioning.

In most of the graphic reports he had with him during an exclusive interview with Fortune on May 21, 2009, the two lines overlapped to the most part; this means the water level in most of the dams has reached the lowest level and is decreasing with the passage of each day. But Miheret asserts that his engineers in charge of each dam are making sure that the waters do not decrease significantly.
 

During normal power generation seasons where the dams have enough water to generate power at their fullest capacity, the daily average reduction in the level of water is about, on average, 10cm to 20cm at each of the dams. However, the energy crisis has now forced EEPCo to allow a decrease of only one to two centimetres each day. That is only possible by cutting down on the supply to consumers. 

"We have to make sure that the amount of water in our dams will enable us generate power till the next rainy season," Miheret said.

But for some keen observers, the current power crisis is mainly due to poor planning in the early years of the introduction of the free market economic policy, as well as the inappropriate structure under which EEPCo has been for the past more than 17 years.
 

When the incumbent introduced its economic policy about 17 years ago, it was expected that the economy would eventually grow and there would be more industries that demand more power. Nevertheless, this was not accompanied by the continuous construction of hydropower generation plants as intensively as it has started to do years after, a critical observer with deep understanding of the sector, told Fortune.
 

"Thus, the crisis has come about not because of the natural imbalance in supply and demand; though the imbalance contributes somewhat, it is insignificant. The core reason is the long period amounting to years between the construction of power generation dams, especially before the launch of the current mega ones," the observer said.

The problem, which is due to the lack of preparedness for the expected growth in demand, is further aggravated by the absence of a separate ministry that is focused on the power issues; EEPCo had first been aligned to other government agencies, such as those responsible for the development of other infrastructure facilities, and is now under the mining sector, so the power sector has not been given due emphasis, this observer argues.
 

Miheret suggests that there are discussions within the government about the structural issue. He also believes that the ongoing construction of hydropower projects have been initiated as projected moves to respond to the expected increase in demand.     
        

"There has never been a time where such huge projects were undertaken simultaneously," he said.  
 

Yet again, had it not been for the natural causes, EEPCo would have hardly been in the current crisis. For instance, in early April when the energy authorities announced the power cut schedule, the two major sources of electric power, Gilgel Gibe I and Melkawakena dams - which have the capacity to generate 184Mw and 153Mw, respectively, had water volumes that allowed them to generate and supply power for a month and a month and a half, respectively.
 

"The hydrology in the existing dams was not in our favour as it was not in line with the meteorological or hydrological forecast we had for this year," Miheret, told Fortune indicating that Ethiopia's energy supply is highly rain dependent, as is the nucleus of its economy - agriculture.

The volume of water the dams received from the Belg rains this year (Ethiopia's second rainy season which lasts from February through April or sometimes May) is significantly lower than what EEPCo had expected, according to the CEO.  
 

On the contrary, unlike in previous years, the delay in the completion of the major hydroelectric power projects, which used to be among the central issues whenever there was talk of the power crisis, now seems to have reached a point where it is unlikely to be an issue anymore.       

The combined 780Mw power EEPCo is set to get from Tekeze and Gilgel Gibe (GG) II Hydroelectric Power Generation dams, which will almost double the current generation capacity, is now three to five months away. The construction of Tekeze, for instance, was finalized last year. However, one thing it has in common with the already operating dams is that it also depends on the expected rain in the coming Keremt (the main rainy season that runs from June through September). It will be commissioned this year provided that it collects enough water in the coming rainy season.
 

Also, one thing the Gishe woreda and the GG II project site have in common, though located in different areas - north and south west of Addis Abeba, respectively - is the difficult terrain in both places.
 

The problem at GG II is related to the nature of the project itself. It is designed to generate 420Mw of power using the water that comes out of the dam for GG I where it generates 184Mw power. GG II does not need its own dam because there are plans to use the already regulated water from GG I dam after it has generated power at the latter. But the construction work on this project has not been a smooth one.    
 

The geo-physical nature of the place had been a fierce challenge to the project contractor, the Italian Salini Costratori, which was awarded the contract in 2004, and to EEPCo's engineers in charge of the project. The major problem had come when the over 25.8Km tunnelling scheme struck problematic geological conditions. The Tunnel Bowring Machine (TBM), a major piece of equipment, was stuck in the tunnel where unexpected sandy soil and water springs turned the 7.1m (diameter) tunnel muddy, slowing the last stretch of digging. After a long delay due to that, the tunnelling continued under harsh conditions due to the underground humidity and associated risks. 
 

Nevertheless, by Friday, May 22, 2009, only about 200m remained for the tunnel to be completed; Semegnew Bekele (Eng.), GG II Project manager, describes the work left as something within a distance visible to the naked eye.
 

It is under the hostile conditions of underground operations that people have worked for about five years; their work included constructing the powerhouse; concrete lining of the bowered tunnel and of the one kilometre long each two penstocks (metal tunnels of 3.8 diameter each) that pour the water from the concrete tunnel to the turbines (generators) with more power and acceleration; as well as the installation of electro-mechanical and hydro-mechanical parts, which are key elements of the power generation.
 

The concrete lining of 1.6m width pre-casts (pre-fabricated concretes) are fixed on the walls of the bowered tunnel. Four pre-cast elements of 1.6m width that form a ring (a circle) when plastered onto the wall, reduce the diameter of the tunnel from 7.1m to 6.3m. Thus, the actual diameter of the tunnel the water runs through is 6.3m. The water from GG I dam generates more power at GG II because of the elevation difference created due to the design at the latter, according to Semegnew. The 100m net head power of the water at GG I that generates 184Mw would have 470m net head power as it runs through the 1,000m long two penstocks of GG II; this would increase the turbine circulation allowing the generation of 420Mw, according to the Project Manager; the plant has four turbines.
 

"You can increase generation by making elevation differences," he told Fortune.        
 

Other works, including installation of transmission lines, have been finalized; GG II has its own substation ready to handle power transmission. It is also connected with the substations at GG End and Sebeta II, which Miheret said is the first transmission lines of their kind in Ethiopia due to the higher voltage. The latter are alternative routes for the mega power generation plant to feed into the national grid.
 

While being a big achievement for both energy authorities and those involved in its construction, GG II also means different things for the two; for the former it   is a visible hope, as is Tekeze, that they consider would bring them a lasting solution for the power crisis that put them in the quandary for consecutive years now. But for the engineers in the field it is beyond that; it is an engineering icon.
 

"It is a masterpiece," Semegnew told Fortune in a tone of pride over the finalization of the project that he has been in charge of for years; he called it a "big achievement."

Though left with the 200 plus metres work on the tunnel to start power generation, strict adherence to international industry standards would still make GG II wait for months before it is commissioned. In addition to cleaning the tunnels, which includes uninstalling the ventilation, electronic, railway trail, and removing machineries from throughout the over 25Km tunnel, there still needs to be international standard tests conducted - dry, wet and commercial tests of the entire system - before its commissioning. The cleaning and the first levels of the tests (the latter take months) are currently underway, according Semegnew.
 

Like any of the power generation facilities in Ethiopia, GG II, however, would likely be dependent on nature's supply of water.    
 

"Hopefully, the time GG II is going to be commissioned, at the end of July, is going to be a good season. But even with the minimum water level where Gibe I can't operate, there is a possibility of opening the bottom out-let gate [of Gibe I] to let water into Gibe II to generate power from the latter," Miheret told Fortune.
 

Nevertheless, whether power generation projects like GG II and Tekeze would come to the rescue of the people who have to suffer blackouts until July, or whether abundant rainfall recovers the water levels of the operating dams in the coming two months is yet to be seen. But, whether this happens or not, the people of Gishe Woreda would be likely to get electricity for the first time.
 

The Eastern Region of EEPCo has started work to install one or two diesel generators in Rabel town to light the woreda for 18 hours a day. This move has come only following an appeal by the people of the woreda to Prime Minister Meles Zenawi who spoke to them in Mehal Meda, another woreda in North Shoa, as part of his trip to some rural parts of the Amhara Regional State about a month ago.
 

But, they would be able to get power from the national grid only when the 32Km road construction from Mekoy area of Oromia Special Zone in Amhara Regional State to Abuye Meda of the Woreda is completed. This road would enable their woreda to get connected to the power substation in Kemise area.

By Omer Redi
Fortune Staff Writer