Mrs. Davis
Principles of Geography
February 11, 2013
Aswan High Dam Aswan High Dam is located in the middle of the Egyptian Desert. This one of the largest embankment dams of the world. Known as Saad el Aali in Arabic, Aswan High Dam is one of the greatest engineering miracles of this world. The dam is 11, 811 ft long, 3215 ft thick at base and 364 ft tall. Aswan High Dam was built in 1960 to control the annual flood of the Nile River. This High Dam of Aswan provides irrigation facility and generates electricity for whole of Egypt. The Dam has created the huge reservoir, the Lake Nassar. The High dam of Aswan added a whole new aspect to the economy of Egypt as well as to the environment of the Egypt. Because of the Aswan High Dam the cultivable land of Egypt has increased 30% but decrease very rapidly after few months. There are three mains ideas against the dam; the dam cancelled the annual flood, move people away of their native place and create a type of pollution in the water and around the reservoir. Since the annual floods from the Nile River stopped, the sediments and silt that were carried all throughout are stopped by the dam. Stanley says “Sediment is primarily retained in an extremely dense network of irrigation and drain channels, and also in wetlands in the northern delta” (Stanley, 1). This decrease of natural fertilizer has resulted in the use of chemic fertilizers. These fertilizers cause pollution of the surrounding environment because they contain high levels of Nitrogen and Phosphorous. Both of these elements are known to cause an increase in algae and to reduce the level in oxygen in the water. The second negative point about the dam, is the delocalization of almost 500 000 peoples of this region. In fact, the creation of the dam created a reservoir and this one is situated in the place where a lot of people used to live. These people had to move to search a better place without the problem of flooding. The third problem is the accessibility to the resource of freshwater. The reservoir of the dam, Lake Nasser, has an important rate of evaporation. The lake was created in a very arid region which is dry and hot. The water loss from the lake is, “…one of the national problems, because the lake is the water bank of Egypt and the evaporated water range between 10 to 16 billion cubic meter every year, which represent 20 to 30% of the Egyptian income from Nile water” (Shalhout, 1). The problem of the availability of freshwater can become a problem if the population growth more and more. In conclusion, in my opinion, the construction of the Aswan High Dam is not a good thing for the country even if there are good advantages such as the creation of electricity. On the other hand, the Dam causes the decreasing of fertility in the field, the moving of a lot of people and a problem with the accessibility of freshwater. We cannot close our eyes to these big problems for the population. References: http://www.futura-sciences.com/fr/doc/t/developpement-durable/d/geopolitique-et-guerre-de-leau_622/c3/221/p4/ http://www.arch.mcgill.ca/prof/sijpkes/arch374/winter2001/dbiggs/aswan.html http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/40203/Aswan-High-Dam http://www.bubastis.be/voyage/nubie/nubie04a.html
Stanley, Daniel. 1996. Nile delta: extreme case of sediment entrapment on a delta plain and consequent coastal land loss. Marine Geology. 129: 189-195.
Shaltout, M. 1997. Estimating the evaporation over Nasser Lake in the upper Egypt from Meteosat observations. Advances in Space Research. 19:515-518