Sardar Sarovar Dam

Sardar Sarovar Dam
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The Sardar Sarovar Dam on Narmada river
Sardar Sarovar Dam is located in Gujarat
Sardar Sarovar Dam
Location of Sardar Sarovar Dam in Gujarat
Official nameSardar Sarovar Dam
LocationNavagam, Kevadia, Narmada District, Gujarat, India
Coordinates21°49′49″N 73°44′50″E / 21.83028°N 73.74722°E / 21.83028; 73.74722
StatusOperational
Construction beganApril 1987
Opening date17 September 2017
Owner(s)Government of Gujarat
Operator(s)Sardar Sarovar Narmada Nigam Limited
Dam and spillways
Type of damGravity dam
ImpoundsNarmada River
Height138.68 meters
Height (foundation)163 m (535 ft)
Length1,210 m (3,970 ft)
Spillways30 (Chute spillway (auxiliary) – 7 : 18.30 m x 18.00 m, Service Spillway – 23 : 18.30 m x 16.75 m)
Spillway typeOgee
Spillway capacity86,944 m3/s (3,070,400 cu ft/s)
Reservoir
CreatesSardar Sarovar Reservoir
Total capacity9.460 km3 (7,669,000 acre⋅ft) (334.12 tmc ft)
Active capacity5.760 km3 (4,670,000 acre⋅ft) (203.44 tmc ft)
Inactive capacity3.700 km3 (3,000,000 acre⋅ft)
Catchment area88,000 km2 (34,000 sq mi)
Surface area375.33 km2 (144.92 sq mi)
Maximum length214 km (133 mi)
Maximum width16.10 km (10.00 mi)
Maximum water depth140m
Normal elevation138 m (453 ft)
Power Station
Operator(s)Sardar Sarovar Narmada Nigam Limited
TurbinesDam: 6 × 200 MW Francis pump-turbine
Canal: 5 × 50 MW Kaplan-type[1]
Installed capacity1,450 MW
Annual generationVaries from 1 Billion kWh in surplus rainfall year to 0.86 Billion kWh in deficit year.
Website
www.sardarsarovardam.org
Sardar Sarovar Dam on Narmada River

The Sardar Sarovar Dam is a concrete gravity dam built on the Narmada River near the town of Kevadiya, in Narmada District, in the Indian state of Gujarat. The dam was constructed to provide water and electricity to the Indian states of Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Rajasthan.

India's first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru laid the foundation of the project on 5 April 1961.[2] The project took form in 1979 as part of a development scheme funded by the World Bank through their International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, to increase irrigation and produce hydroelectricity, using a loan of US$200 million.[3] The construction for dam begun in 1987, but the project was stalled by the Supreme Court of India in 1995 in the backdrop of Narmada Bachao Andolan over concerns of displacement of people. In 2000–01 the project was revived but with a lower height of 111 meters under directions from SC, which was later increased in 2006 to 123 meters and 139 meters in 2017. The Sardar Sarovar Dam is 1210 meters long.[4] The dam was inaugurated in 2017 by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.[5] The water level in the Sardar Sarovar Dam eventually reached its highest capacity at 138.7 metres on 15 September 2019.[6][7]

As one of the 25 dams planned on river Narmada, the Sardar Sarovar Dam is the largest structure to be built. It is the second largest concrete dam in the world in terms of the volume of concrete used in its construction, after the Grand Coulee Dam across the Columbia River, US.[8][9] It is a part of the Narmada Valley Project, a large hydraulic engineering project involving the construction of a series of large irrigation and hydroelectricity multi-purpose dams on the Narmada River. After a number of cases before the Supreme Court of India (1999, 2000, 2003), by 2014 the Narmada Control Authority had approved a series of changes in the final height and the associated displacement caused by the increased reservoir, from the original 80 m (260 ft) to a final 163 m (535 ft) from foundation.[10][11] The project will irrigate 1.9 million hectare area, most of it in drought prone areas of Kutch and Saurashtra.

The dam's main power plant houses six 200 megawatts (MW) Francis pump-turbines to generate electricity and include a pumped-storage capability. Additionally, a power plant on the intake for the main canal contains five 50MW Kaplan turbine-generators. The total installed capacity of the power facilities is 1,450 MW.[12] The tallest statue in the world, the Statue of Unity, faces the dam. This statue has been created as a symbol of tribute to Vallabhbhai Patel.[13]

  1. ^ "Pumped-Storage Hydroelectric Plants — Asia-Pacific". IndustCards. Archived from the original on 8 December 2012. Retrieved 20 January 2012.
  2. ^ "56 years of Sardar Sarovar Dam: Narendra Modi dedicates Jawaharlal Nehru's temple of resurgent India to nation". Archived from the original on 25 April 2023. Retrieved 25 April 2023.
  3. ^ Original report – Narmada dam development project (PDF). Washington DC: World Bank. 6 February 1985. Archived (PDF) from the original on 4 April 2019. Retrieved 4 April 2019.
  4. ^ "Sardar Sarovar Dam: Years of dispute, finally full height". 18 September 2017. Archived from the original on 17 May 2019. Retrieved 17 May 2019.
  5. ^ "Modi Inaugurates World's Second Biggest Dam On His Birthday". Huffingtonpost. 17 September 2019. Archived from the original on 19 November 2020. Retrieved 13 November 2020.
  6. ^ "Sardar Sarovar dam water level touches its highest mark". The Economic Times. 15 September 2019. Archived from the original on 9 December 2020. Retrieved 16 September 2019.
  7. ^ "Sardar Sarovar Dam Water Level Touches its Highest Mark, PM Modi to Visit Site on Sept 17". News18. 15 September 2019. Archived from the original on 21 September 2019. Retrieved 16 September 2019.
  8. ^ "PM Modito inaugurate world's second biggest dam on September 17". The Indian Express. Indo-Asian News Service. 14 September 2017. Archived from the original on 4 July 2019. Retrieved 31 December 2018.
  9. ^ "Narendra Modi inaugurates Sardar Sarovar Dam". Al Jazeera. 17 September 2017. Archived from the original on 6 November 2018. Retrieved 31 December 2018.
  10. ^ Cite error: The named reference go was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  11. ^ "Sardar Sarovar Power Complex". Narmada Control Authority. Archived from the original on 30 March 2012. Retrieved 20 January 2012.
  12. ^ "World bank projects in India – Narmada development". World Bank. Archived from the original on 4 April 2019.
  13. ^ "Did You Know How Height of Sardar Patel's 'Statue of Unity' Was Decided? | Day 3 Onboard 'Garvi Gujarat'". News 18. 3 March 2023. Archived from the original on 25 April 2023. Retrieved 25 April 2023.