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An agency of the United Nations has cleared Zambia and Zimbabwe to build a $5 billion hydropower dam downstream from Victoria Falls, a Unesco World Heritage Site, the authority overseeing its construction said.

The 2 400 megawatt Batoka Gorge project, 47 kilometres from the world’s largest waterfall, has been opposed by environmentalists because of the potential impact it would have on the cataract, a key tourist site for both countries, that spans the Zambezi River.

Unesco “sent inspectors in 2022 after complaints by some environmentalists that the Batoka project was going to affect the Victoria Falls,” Munyaradzi Munodawafa, chief executive officer of the Zambezi River Authority, said in an interview.

They “looked at the reports and our presentations and agreed that Batoka could go ahead” at a meeting of the World Heritage Committee last month, he said.

Construction of the 181-metre (594-foot) high wall and power plants by a group led by General Electric Co, and China’s Power Construction had been expected to start in 2020 but was delayed by the Covid-19 pandemic and funding concerns. Both Zambia and Zimbabwe, who already share the Kariba hydropower facility further east on the Zambezi, at times have struggled to meet their power needs.

“Now we are good to go” said Munodawafa. “We are on solid ground and by end of next month, I will have an actual date of commencement.” Unesco didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

The African Development Bank is the lead arranger for the financing of Batoka, which has been designed as a run-of-river project, meaning that there will be little storage of water behind the turbines, minimising the impact on the Victoria Falls.

Munodawafa also said the US$130 million rehabilitation of a plunge pool below the wall of the Kariba dam, which holds back the world’s biggest artificial reservoir, is expected to be completed by early 2025.

Further downstream, in Mozambique, the AfDB is also advising on the US$4,5 billion, 1 500-megawatt Mphanda Nkuwa hydropower project. – Bloomberg