Mighty Giants- Highest Dams Of Them All


01. The Nurek Dam

The Nurek Dam is an earth fill embankment dam on the Vakhsh river in the central Asian nation of Tajikistan. Construction of the dam began in 1961 and was completed in 1980, when Tajikistan was still a republic within the Soviet Union. At 300 m (984 ft) it is currently the tallest dam in the world. The Rogun Dam, also along the Vakhsh also in Tajikistan, may exceed it if completed.

The Nurek Dam was constructed by the Soviet Union between the years of 1961 and 1980. It is uniquely constructed, with a central core of cement forming an impermeable barrier within a 300 m (980 ft)-high rock and earth fill construction. The volume of the mound is 54 million m³. The dam includes nine hydroelectric generating units, the first commissioned in 1972 and the last in 1979.

02. The Xiaowan Dam

The Xiaowan Dam is an arch dam on the Lancang (Mekong) River in Nanjian County, Yunnan Province, southwest China. The primary purpose of the dam is hydroelectric power generation and it supports a 4,200 MW power station. Constructed between 2002 and 2010 by Huaneng Power International at a cost of ¥32 billion (nearly US$3.9 billion), it is the world’s highest arch dam at 292 m and the third largest hydroelectric power station in China.


03. The Grande Dixence Dam

The Grande Dixence, the world’s highest gravity dam, collects the meltwater of 35 Valaisian glaciers in the region surrounding Zermatt and leading up to Val d’Hérens. Grande Dixence, built in the years from 1951 to 1965, is a construction of incredible magnitude. It is 200 meters thick at the base, 695 meters long and 285 meters high. Six million cubic meters of concrete were required for the construction of the dam.


04. The Inguri Dam

The Inguri Dam, western Georgia, is the world’s highest arch dam (completed 1980), located on the Inguri River in western Georgia near the point at which the river leaves the Caucasus Mountains on its way to the Black Sea. It is a huge272m tall double-curvature arch dam with a crest length of 2,231 feet (680 m). The dam was built of interlocking stacks of concrete monoliths laid over reinforced limestone bedrock. The five-unit power plant associated with the dam has a planned power capacity of 1,300 megawatts.


05. The Vajont Dam

The Vajont Dam was the scene of one of the 20th century’s worst engineering disasters. The tallest dam in the world when it was completed in 1959, at 262m, it was beset with problems from the beginning. On October 9, 1963, before it had even been completely filled, an enormous landslide (the 2km-long scar of which can still be clearly seen) sent 260 million cubic metres of mountainside into the lake behind the dam, causing a wave of water 250 metres high to spill over into the valley below. The giant wave completely destroyed five villages, killing almost 2,000 people, maybe even more. Strangely, the dam itself was relatively undamaged and still stands today, with the upstream face largely buried beneath the landslide.



06. The Chicoasén Dam

The Chicoasén Dam (officially known as Manuel M. Torres) is an embankment dam and hydroelectric power station on the Grijalva River near Chicoasén in Chiapas, Mexico. The dam was designed in the early 1970s and constructed between 1974 and 1980 under topographical and geological constraints. It is an earth and rock fill embankment type with a height of 261 m and length of 485 m. It withholds a reservoir of 1,613,000,000 m3 and lies at the head of a 52,600 km2 catchment area.


07. The Tehri Dam

The Tehri Dam is a multi-purpose rock and earth-fill dam on the Bhagirathi River near Tehri in Uttarakhand, India. The dam is a 260 meters (850 ft) high rock and earth-fill embankment dam. Its length is 575 metres (1,886 ft), crest width 20 metres (66 ft), and base width 1,128 metres. The dam creates a reservoir of 2.6 cubic kilometres with a surface area of 52 square kilometres. The installed hydrocapacity is 1,000 MW along with an additional 1,000 MW of pumped storage hydroelectricity.

08. The Lac de Mauvoisin Dam

The Lac de Mauvoisin is a lake in the canton of Valais, Switzerland. The reservoir is formed by the Mauvoisin Dam, which is 250 m high. The dam is currently the 8th highest in the world, and the third highest arch dam. It was built in 1951–1957, and raised by 13.5 m in 1991. The reservoir lies in the upper Val de Bagnes, to the east of the Grand Combin.


09. The Laxiwa Dam

The Laxiwa Dam is an arch dam on the Yellow River in Qinghai Province, northwest China. It is 32 km (20 mi) downstream of the Longyangxia Dam and 73 km (45 mi) upstream from the Lijiaxia Dam. The main purpose of the dam is hydroelectric power generation and it supports the largest station in the Yellow River basin. The facility generates power by utilizing six turbines, each with a generating capacity of 700 MW, totaling to a capacity of 4,200 MW. It is 250m high dam.



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