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The Reventazón River, , (), is a river in
Costa Rica
Costa Rica (, ; ; literally "Rich Coast"), officially the Republic of Costa Rica ( es, República de Costa Rica), is a country in the Central American region of North America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the no ...
.
Geography
Reventazón River forms part of the Reventazón-Parismina
drainage basin
A drainage basin is an area of land where all flowing surface water converges to a single point, such as a river mouth, or flows into another body of water, such as a lake or ocean. A basin is separated from adjacent basins by a perimeter, t ...
, it is long and flows into the
Caribbean
The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Se ...
sea. It starts at the base of the
Irazú Volcano
The Irazú Volcano ( es, Volcán Irazú) is an active volcano in Costa Rica, situated in the Cordillera Central close to the city of Cartago.
The name could come from either the combination of "ara" (point) and "tzu" (thunder) or a corruptio ...
, passing through the east side of the
Central Valley, and flows through the
Orosí
Orosi is a district of the Paraíso canton, in the Cartago province of Costa Rica.
History
Orosi is one of the oldest communities in Costa Rica. The village of Orosi was chosen, together with Ujarrás, by the Spanish conquerors to establis ...
and Turrialba Valleys. After reaching the Caribbean coastal plains it joins the
Parismina
Barra del Parismina is a village of about 500 people located on the Caribbean coast of Costa Rica, at the mouth of the Reventazón River. Parismina is about halfway between Tortuguero and Limón on the Tortuguero canals. There is no road to Pari ...
River and forms what is called the Reventazón-Parismina.
Economy
Water supply
In its upper segments, the Reventazón River is the source of 25% of the drinking water of Costa Rica's largest metropolitan area centered on
San Jose.
Hydropower generation
The river is very important for power generation. Three reservoirs in the river,
Lake Cachí (100.8 MW), Angostura (177MW) and
Reventazón Dam (305.5MW) are used for generating a significant share of Costa Rica's electricity. The dam for the third reservoir,
Reventazón (305MW), was completed and opened in 2016. The river is also important for tourism, specially for whitewater rafting.
Tourism
Rafting is practiced in the river, which has Class 2-3 rapids in its Florida section.
Ecosystem
The
bobo mullet
The bobo mullet (''Joturus pichardi''), is a species of ray-finned fish of the mullet family Mugilidae. It is the only species in the genus ''Joturus'', one of 17 mullet genera containing altogether about 80 species of ray-finned fish. It occu ...
(''Joturus pichardi'') is native to the Parismina River and is fished here for subsistence consumption and sometimes commercially.
See also
*
Codo del Diablo murders
References
Rivers of Costa Rica
{{CostaRica-river-stub