Beles River (''Kusa'' in

Gumuz language Gumuz (also spelled Gumaz) is a dialect cluster spoken along the border of Ethiopia and Sudan. It has been tentatively classified within the Nilo-Saharan family. Most Ethiopian speakers live in Kamashi Zone and Metekel Zone of the Benishangul-Gu ...

) is a river of western

Ethiopia Ethiopia, , om, Itiyoophiyaa, so, Itoobiya, ti, ኢትዮጵያ, Ítiyop'iya, aa, Itiyoppiya officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the ...

. A tributary of the Abay river (better known as the

Blue Nile The Blue Nile (; ) is a river originating at Lake Tana in Ethiopia. It travels for approximately through Ethiopia and Sudan. Along with the White Nile, it is one of the two major tributaries of the Nile and supplies about 85.6% of the water ...

), the Beles rises in

Dangur Dangur is one of the 20 Districts of Ethiopia, or ''woredas'', in the Benishangul-Gumuz Region of Ethiopia. It is named after the Dangur range of mountains, which extend southwest from the mountains along the west side of Lake Tana. The administrat ...

woreda Districts of Ethiopia, also called woredas ( am, ወረዳ; ''woreda''), are the third level of the administrative divisions of Ethiopia – after ''zones'' and the '' regional states''. These districts are further subdivided into a number of ...

to flow in a south-west direction to its confluence. Its catchment area amounts to about 14,200 square kilometers.

Course

The source is located 15 km west of Lake Tana at an elevation of above sea level. The mouth of the river Beles in the Blue Nile is located about 40 km upstream of the

Grand Ethiopian Renaissance dam , image = , image_caption = The main dam after first filling , image_alt = , location_map_caption = , coordinates = , country = Ethiopia , location = Guba, Benishangul-Gumuz Region , purpose = Power , status = UC , construction_began ...

that is under construction, and the water of the Beles will be used in the future.

Transferred water from Lake Tana

Since the Tana Beles hydroelectric power plant has been put into operation in 2010, the Beles has received water from

Lake Tana Lake Tana ( am, ጣና ሐይቅ, T’ana ḥāyik’i; previously Tsana) is the largest lake in Ethiopia and the source of the Blue Nile. Located in Amhara Region in the north-western Ethiopian Highlands, the lake is approximately long and wid ...

via the Tana-Beles

interbasin transfer Interbasin transfer or transbasin diversion are (often hyphenated) terms used to describe man-made conveyance schemes which move water from one river basin where it is available, to another basin where water is less available or could be utilized ...

, which is to be used in a series of irrigation projects below the power plant. For this purpose a series of dams were built. Beles downstream of Tana outlet

These large water transfers from

to Beles River affect the movement of people, the hydrogeomorphology, and ecology of the river. The

Environmental Impact Assessment Environmental Impact assessment (EIA) is the assessment of the environmental consequences of a plan, policy, program, or actual projects prior to the decision to move forward with the proposed action. In this context, the term "environmental imp ...

of the Beles hydropower project is however considered a formality and is unfindable. The social impacts of the Tana-Beles water transfer have been studied and results published in the high-profile ''

Journal of Hydrology ''Journal of Hydrology'' () is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by Elsevier about hydrological sciences including water based management Water (chemical formula ) is an inorganic, transparent, tasteless, odorless, and nearly col ...

'': the dangerously high increases in discharge of Beles river have led to the drowning of 250 people between 2010 and 2018. The negative impacts on rural livelihoods are however overshadowed by national development goals (electricity production). The external costs (coping with damage) are borne by local people, who have low bargaining power.

Notes

{{Coord, 10, 54, N, 35, 16, E, display=title, region:ET_type:river_source:GNS-enwiki Rivers of Ethiopia Tributaries of the Blue Nile

Course

Transferred water from Lake Tana

See also

Notes