Afghanistan’s Energy and Water Ministry has signed a US$2M contract with an Iranian firm to conduct preliminary studies on the construction of the 120MW Gol Bahar Dam on the Panj Shir River in northern Afghanistan.
The scope of work includes ecological and terrestrial studies, as well as assessing the technical feasibility of constructing the dam.
According to the Afghan Ministry of Water and Energy, the country has the potential to develop as much as 12,000 MW of electricity. Afghanistan intends to construct 30 dams to produce part of the needed hydroelectricity using them. The country generates 400MW of electricity currently and buys 500MW from Iran, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.