Kariba Dam rehabilitation commences
THE Kariba Dam Rehabilitation Project, meant to increase the lifespan and holding capacity of the country’s major hydro-power source has commenced and is expected to gobble up US$119 million which will be spread out over the next four years.
THE Zambezi River Authority (ZRA) in its corporate strategy for 2020-2024 noted that it intends to spend US$42 million this year, US$37 million in 2021, US$25 million in 2022 and US$15 million in 2023. Kariba Dam is home to Zimbabwe’s biggest hydro-power station which has the installed capacity to supply more than 1 000 megawatts of electricity.
“The rehabilitation works aimed at ensuring the long-term safety of the dam continued during the review period. These works include the reshaping of the Plunge Pool in order to increase its energy dissipation capacity so as to prevent erosion of the dam foundations and refurbishment of the Spillway facility to free the operation of the dam’s stoplogs and flood discharge gates.
The reshaping of the Plunge Pool was expected to be completed by the end of 2021 whilst the Spillway Refurbishment Project was expected to be completed within six (6) years,” reads the statement.
ZRA said it will set in motion the much anticipated Batoka Gorge Hydro-Electric Scheme. According to the set budget the completion of the project will gobble approximately US$ 4,3 billion spread out over five years.
“Work to complete the feasibility studies and other pre-construction activities was expected to be completed by the end of December 2019. A major decision was made by the Council of Ministers to change the commercial structure of the development of the scheme to Build Operate and Transfer. This was done in order to achieve early delivery of the project. A developer was procured with construction anticipated to commence at the end of 2020,” reads the document.
The authority also said it will seek to increase water storage volume on the Zambezi River Basin catchment under the authority from the current 181 billion cubic metres to 182,65 billion cubic metres by 2024. Under the new strategy ZRA also seeks to increase access to sustainable social amenities in the Riparian Communities by US$1,2 million by 2024. The communities are those that live along the river.
“We intend to increase water storage volume on the Zambezi River Basin catchment managed by the authority from the current 181 billion cubic metres to 182,65 billion cubic metres by 2024.
“This will be achieved by intensifying mobilisation of resources for infrastructure development and maintenance as well as accelerating project implementation. Another objective is to increase access to sustainable social amenities in the Riparian Communities by US$1,2 million by 2024.
This will be achieved by developing water harvesting infrastructure, increase utilisation of ground water and extraction of water from the Zambezi River. External financial partnerships will be available. We will rely on continued support from the local authorities, communities and traditional leadership.
Another objective is to increase NonTraditional Revenue Growth from 1,5 percent to 2,5 percent of operating Revenue by 2024. This will be done by opening new streams of revenue,” reads the document.
ZRA launched the new corporate strategy following the its expiry of the 2015-2019.
“It is noteworthy that 31 December 2019 marked the close of a five-year cycle of the authority’s corporate strategy which subsisted from the year 2015. To this end, the authority engaged MaCoTra (Pvt) Limited of Zimbabwe in July 2019 for the provision of consultancy services regarding the process of formulating the Corporate Strategy for the period 2020 to 2024 through facilitation of strategic planning workshops. Following extensive consultations with the authority’s stakeholders, the corporate strategy for the period 2020-2024 has been formulated.
“The authority recognises the dynamic internal and external environments in which it operates. Therefore, in formulating this corporate strategy, the authority has positioned itself to continue delivering on its mandate. To ensure the set goals are achieved, the Integrated Results Based Management (IBRM) performance management system will be utilised in the roll-out of the Corporate Strategy,” reads part of the corporate strategy document.