Ethiopia’s Ministry of Water, Irrigation and Electricity (MoWIE) has contracted the state-owned Ethiopian Construction Design & Supervision Works Corporation to prepare feasibility studies and the design for the 150 MW Wabi hydropower project in Welkite in the Gurage Zone of the Southern Nations, Nationalities & Peoples (SNNP) region. Under the terms of the Birr 22.3 million (US$ 810 320) contract, which was signed on 2 May, the studies are to be completed in 18 months.
The engineering consultancy was created in 2015 from the consolidation of three state-owned consultancies. It is currently completing the construction of the 21.2 m-high Gidabo dam, on the border of the states of Oromia and SNNP in south-central Ethiopia, which is scheduled to be commissioned in the first half of this year. It will be the ninth dam to have been built by the firm.
It and its constituent entities have previously been responsible for the design, supervision and, in most cases, the construction of numerous water supply projects in Ethiopia, mainly for the provision of water for irrigation, including the 76 m-high Megech dam near Gondar in the northwestern state of Amhara; the 73 m-high earthfill Ribb dam in the South Gondar Zone of Amhara, which was completed in September 2017; the Kesem earthfill dam on the river Kesem, in the northeastern state of Afar, which was commissioned in 2015; and, the 53 m-high Tendaho earthfill dam on the river Awash in Afar, which was completed in January 2017. It is also managing 10 dams on behalf of the MoWIE, seven on behalf of the Sugar Dev-elopment Corporation and three others, which are jointly owned by the MoWIE and the state-owned sugar producer.
