Itezhi-Tezhi Hydropower Project A TATA POWER/ZESCO Joint Venture Company

The Itezhi-tezhi Dam was built between 1974 and 1977 to provide additional water storage for the 900 MW Kafue Gorge Upper Power Station situated roughly 260 km downstream. The Itezhi-tezhi dam is a 65-meter-high earth and rockfill embankment dam with a crest length of 1.8 km, which forms a 5.66 billion cubic meter reservoir with an area of 350 square kilometers at full supply level. The original design and construction of the dam included facilities such as the intakes, spillway gates, tunnels and the regulation gate to allow for the future development of a power station. Upon completion of dam construction, the diversion tunnel on the south bank was closed to flow by a concrete seal plug, whilst a radial regulation gate was installed on the diversion tunnel to provide a low-level outlet for the reservoir. Development of the 120 MW Itezhi-tezhi hydropower station at the southern end of the dam commenced in 2011; it was commissioned in 2016. The project involved modifications to the existing intake, construction of an underground cavern to house two 60 MW Kaplan turbines, an access tunnel to the underground cavern, and the placement of a switchyard at the outlet of the access tunnel along with a 300 km 220/330kV transmission line to evacuate the power through substations at Mumbwa and Lusaka-West.