- Ethiopia inaugurated Africa’s largest hydroelectric dam in 2025, positioning itself as a regional energy exporter while millions of its citizens still lack access to electricity.
- Egypt, which lies downstream in the Nile Basin, views the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam as an existential threat, warning of risks to Nile water security and regional stability.
- Scientists caution that dam failures or mismanagement could trigger catastrophic flooding in Sudan and Egypt.
- Critics argue that the dam may serve as a geopolitical and public relations tool, while its environmental and social impacts remain insufficiently assessed.
This January, U.S. President Donald Trump offered to act as a mediator between Egypt and Ethiopia over Nile River waters, signaling renewed interest in the dispute. Ethiopia’s flagship project, the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), launched in 2011, has been a source of prolonged friction among Nile Basin countries. The row intensified with the dam’s official inauguration on Sept. 9, 2025, with Egyptian leaders accusing Ethiopia of violating international law.
With a length of 1,780 meters (5,840 feet) and a capacity of 5,150 megawatts (MW), it is the largest hydroelectric dam in Africa by capacity. The $5 billion project, which was mainly financed by Ethiopians and their government, also benefited from Chinese loans and investments.
The presidents of Djibouti, South Sudan, Somalia and Kenya attended the inauguration ceremony. “The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam is not only a feat of engineering ambition; it is also a bold affirmation of Africa’s capacity to shape its own destiny, marshal its resources and deliver transformative infrastructure in pursuit of prosperity,” Kenyan President William Ruto, who reiterated his willingness to strengthen trade relations with Ethiopia, said during a speech at the inauguration ceremony.
Ruto had good reasons to be pleased. In 2022, Kenya and Ethiopia signed a power purchase agreement establishing a 500-kilovolt transmission line between the two countries. Ethiopia committed to selling substantial amounts of renewable electricity to Kenya over 25 years, starting with 200MW during the first three years and gradually increasing it to 400MW, which is more than 10% of Kenya’s current electricity production capacity. To meet this goal, the Ethiopian government sees the completion of the dam as crucial. Maintaining strong relations with Ethiopia is in Kenya’s interest too.
A dam of discord
Egypt was conspicuously absent from the inauguration ceremony. Egypt’s minister for foreign affairs, emigration and Egyptian expatriates, Badr Abdelatty, stated that Ethiopia’s construction of the Renaissance Dam, despite strong objections from the two downstream countries, Egypt and Sudan, was “illegal.”
“The Nile River is an international transboundary river, and Ethiopia’s actions regarding the dam violate international law and are not in accordance with its principles,” Abdelatty said on an Egyptian TV channel.
On the same day as the GERD was inaugurated, Abdelatty sent a letter to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) calling on the international body to urge Ethiopia to “cease its unlawful unilateral practices in the Nile basin.”
According to Egypt, the dam pose “an existential threat to the rights and interests of the 150 million citizens of the downstream countries, Egypt and Sudan, and consequently jeopardize regional and international peace and security.”
In the same letter, Egypt warned that it would use “its right to take all appropriate measures to defend and protect the existential interests of the Egyptian people” if problems arose.
To understand Egypt’s hostility toward the project, a geographical reminder is necessary. The GERD is located on the Blue Nile, one of the tributaries of the world’s second-longest river, the Nile. The Nile is formed by the confluence of the White Nile, originating from Lake Victoria, and the Blue Nile, which originates from Lake Tana in Ethiopia. This confluence takes place in Khartoum, Sudan’s capital, before the river flows some 6,700 kilometers (4,163 miles], traversing Egypt from south to north before emptying into the Mediterranean Sea.
Egypt has a long agricultural tradition that enables it to cope with the desert and semiarid climate. The country receives little rainfall, around 18 millimeters (0.7 inches) annually, yet agriculture accounts for 13% of its GDP. By comparison, Ethiopia receives approximately 848 mm (33 in) of rainfall annually.
The French Institute for International and Strategic Affairs (IRIS) estimates that Egypt is currently in a state of “hyper-dependence” on Nile waters. By 2050, the country is expected to experience a temperature increase of 1.8- 2.9°Celsius (3.2-5.2° Fahrenheit), while rainfall could decrease 5-10%. This would further increase aridity and exacerbate Egypt’s dependence on the Nile to sustain agriculture. Egypt, therefore, would not want to see the flow of the iconic river reduced upstream by a mega-dam.
“Any decrease in Egypt’s water share will lead to a decline in agricultural production, causing huge losses for farmers. This may lead to more destruction and desertification of agricultural lands, which will negatively affect the country’s food security. It will contribute to the decline of agricultural exports,” warned Haj Hussein Abdul Rahman Abu Saddam, farmer and head of Egypt General Farmers’ Syndicate, while specifying that, for the moment, the dam has not had any impact on his farm.
A joint study conducted by researchers from universities in Egypt, Slovakia and Poland modeled impacts in terms of flooding in Sudan and Egypt in the case of a massive structural failure at GERD.
The results showed that Khartoum would turn into lakes within about 10 days, and floodwater depth would exceed 11 meters (36 feet) at some locations in residential areas. Moreover, the flood waves overtop [overflow] the Roseires, Sennar and Merowe dams [in Sudan] by 11, 7 and 20 m (36, 23 and 66 ft), respectively, which could lead to their collapse, according to the study.
In addition, the level of Lake Nasser, the reservoir of the Aswan Dam, in Egypt, would reach 188 meters (617 ft) above sea level, “and the Aswan High Dam might be in great danger,” the study said.
The study authors also pointed to the risk from the dam being situated in the heart of the Rift Valley, an earthquake-prone zone. They recommended the development of “an emergency plan and disaster mitigation strategies to limit the damage in the event of such a catastrophic failure.”.
Historical fight for the Nile River
Since 2011, Egypt, supported by Sudan, has sought to modify the project through successive rounds of negotiations.
According to Biraanu Gammachu Feyissa, a political analyst, in addition to food security issues, Egypt refuses to let Ethiopia benefit from the Nile for historical reasons. “I think Egyptians and Sudanese governments are heavily dwelling on the colonial treaties,” he says.
Since the 19th century, Egypt and Sudan were under the rule of Great Britain. British colonial officials decided to manage the river without involving Ethiopia, which was independent. Sudan and Egypt, hence, got the lion’s share. After independence, Egypt and Sudan entered into an agreement to continue managing the Nile, but without including Ethiopia and other upstream countries, this has resulted in perennial tensions.
In 1999, the Nile Basin Initiative was launched, incorporating the 10 countries of the basin: Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, DRC, Egypt, Ethiopia and Eritrea (as an oberver). The goal was “to ensure socioeconomic development through the equitable and beneficial use of the shared water resources of the Nile Basin.” It also aimed to prevent conflict over the use of the river’s waters in the regions.
In 2010, the Entebbe Agreement decreed that each state in the basin has the right to use its waters on its territory, on condition that no significant damage is caused to the other states therein. However, not everyone agrees on the same definition of “significant damage.” As a result, the construction of the dam was announced despite opposition from Egypt and Sudan. In 2015, a “Declaration of Principles” was signed between the three countries , but the fate of the dam remained undecided. Negotiations continued with several players getting involved, including the UNSC, Saudi Arabia, the U.S. as well as the African Union. The Pan-African body managed to reach a regional nonbinding agreement on the filling of the dam, but Ethiopia did not recognize it.
The planned construction of the GERD went ahead, and the dam was finally inaugurated in September 2025.
“It is time for Africa to refine its agreements, and I hope Ethiopia will reach an agreement with the countries downstream of the Nile, because when you look at the power arrangements, the electricity that will be generated by this dam will not just serve Ethiopia; it will also serve Kenya, Djibouti, Sudan. … We need to have a regional agreement that serves the needs of Africans rather than relying on the age-old agreements,” said Amos Wemanya, a senior adviser on renewable energy and just transition at Power Shift Africa.
Public relations or an actual solution for Ethiopians?
Meanwhile, Ethiopians are still power-starved. “I am in Addis Ababa, and in a single week, we experience power outages two or three times. They [power outages] can last two to three hours on average. This is serious because it affects daily lives and work,” Gammachu said, adding, “If the capital city faces such challenges, one can only imagine the situation in rural areas, where connectivity and grids are minimal, and around 60% of Ethiopian households do not have access to electricity.”
More than 92% of households in Ethiopia rely on biomass to cook, posing serious risks to health, productivity and forest conservation. It remains unclear how power from the dam will be apportioned for domestic users and exportation.
At the same time, the dam has generated hope for citizens and businesses. “We are a startup that locally assembles electric motorbikes and sells them to drivers who use them for commercial purposes, mainly delivery. We have sold about 1,400 bikes over the past two years and aim to reach 30,000 customers within the next three years. For that, abundant and cheap electricity is key,” explained Yuma Sasaki, founder and CEO of Dodai, an e-mobility company. This shift toward e-mobility makes sense. In January 2024, Ethiopia became the first in the world to ban imports of nonelectric private vehicles.
But Gammachu cautioned: “There is a lot of PR [public relations] regarding the dam, a national pride bringing a miracle in terms of power infrastructure and power coverage. The reality on the ground seems different. When people think of the dam, they think in terms of daily electric consumption and daily electric demand.”
He suggested that a network of smaller dams distributed across the country might have improved electricity access nationally. “The government may be more interested in exporting electricity and making billions of dollars from it. But will that really improve the lives of Ethiopian citizens? I have reservations,” the political analyst added.
Ethiopia currently sells electricity to Kenya, Sudan and Djibouti. Soon it will be sold to Tanzania, which is in ongoing negotiations with South Sudan.
“It’s part of the East Africa power pool. This is part of the AU’s continental power systems master plan. We are building a system where energy is shared among countries in the region. This is meant to increase grid stability. When one country has a surplus of electricity, it doesn’t go to waste. It shares with its neighbors,” Wemanya said. “It helps Africa in its energy transition, and given the current geopolitical situation in the world, it is better to collaborate in Africa than outside,” he added.
So far, it is unclear how much power from GERD will be supplied to Ethiopia’s domestic power grid. “No power has been sold without meeting domestic demand,” Ethiopian Electric Power (EEP) deputy CEO Andualem Sia said at a press conference in August 2025, ahead of the dam inauguration.
The question of meeting domestic needs is an important one. In Ethiopia, 56% of the population still lacks access to basic electricity. According to the World Bank, this is due to a lack of reliable supply, particularly in rural areas and secondary towns, where aging infrastructure, weak voltage regulation and technical losses affect service. The Ethiopian government says it is addressing the issue via the National Energy Compact. This blueprint aims, among other things, to reach 75% electricity access by 2030. Sia suggested that foreign exchange earned from exporting power could be used to “expand transmission lines and extend access to underserved communities.”
For Gammachu, the dam also serves as a tool to consolidate government soft power. “There are insurgencies in Ethiopia, particularly in economically sensitive regions like Oromia, Amhara and Tigray. The government tends to project its power through bringing in such huge projects and then telling the public, ‘You know, this government is bringing this huge investment.’ There is romanticizing of mega-projects, but they also carry bad elements like incentivizing corruption, decreasing transparency, and its environmental impact is not well assessed. In Ethiopia, we really don’t know about the environmental impact,” he said.
During its reporting, Mongabay was unable to find an official environmental and social impact assessment for the GERD project online. We also contacted Ethiopia’s Ministry of Water and Energy to obtain the document in vain. However, a 2015 study, from the International Sustainability Institute in Egypt, outlines several potential impacts, mainly related to reservoir creation and changes in water systems, including a decrease in biodiversity and impact on threatened species.
Mongabay contacted Ethiopia’s Ministry of Water and Energy for comment, but received no response.
While the Ethiopian government celebrates the GERD as a symbol of sovereignty, sustainable development and continental ambition, the dam continues to be a divisive issue. For countries downstream, like Egypt, it embodies an existential risk. For millions of Ethiopians who still live without reliable electricity, and for African countries long deprived of their influence over the world’s second-longest river, it represents hope.
Banner image: Tigray Farmer, Ethiopia. Image by Rod Waddington via Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0).
Citations:
Eldeeb, H. M., Ibrahim, A., Mowafy, M. H., Zeleňáková, M., Abd-Elhamid, H. F., Pietrucha-Urbanik, K., & Ghonim, M. T. (2023). Assessment of dams’ failure and flood wave hazards on the downstream countries: A case study of the grand ethiopian Renaissance dam (GERD). Water, 15(8), 1609. doi:10.3390/w15081609
Wheeler, K. G., Jeuland, M., Hall, J. W., Zagona, E., & Whittington, D. (2020). Understanding and managing new risks on the Nile with the grand ethiopian Renaissance dam. Nature Communications, 11(1). doi:10.1038/s41467-020-19089-x
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