DOLAKHA, March 16: The technical assessment at the dam site of the under-construction national pride project, Upper Tamakoshi Hydropower Project at Lamabagar of Dolakha is scheduled from today. The openings of the dam will be sealed and the water of Tamakoshi River will be collected at the sand sedimentation reservoir.
The water of Tamakoshi River will be gradually released in the reservoir with the capacity of holding 2 million cubic water and later will emptied till April 4. Stating that the procedure might result in water level fluctuation, the project officials have requested the locals residing in the banks to not go near the river and adopt preventive measures.
Delay in Upper Tamakoshi causes huge financial loss
The 456 MW Upper Tamakoshi Project is being built at Bigu Rural Municipality-1, Gongar of Lamabagar village with domestic investment. The water of Tamakoshi River reserved in the dam and flowed through the 8 kilometers tunnel way and penstock will spin six turbines installed in the underground power house.
The construction of the project has not gained momentum as per the target because of delay by the contractor company Indian firm, Texmaco Rail and Engineering, which is responsible for the installation of iron gates and penstock pipe. Currently, the installation of penstock pipe is going on. Project officials have informed that most of the works have been completed in the dam site.
Bimal Gurung, senior engineer of the project, said that the construction work is almost complete, and the functionality of dam site structures is scheduled to be tested individually. “We will be meticulously testing the functionality of dam, intake, sedimentation reservoir, iron gates and other civil structures from Monday to April 4,” he told Republica, “It is an important work for the project.”
According to Gurung, the water in the dam will not be sealed and let out at once. “The filling and letting out the water from the tank will be done step by step,” he said, “Though the water will be let out little by little, the level of water will fluctuate in the river bank side.”
The project issuing a notice about the possible fluctuation in the water level on Saturday, has asked the locals to be careful. Similarly, the project has asked people to be careful in the section from Singati to the meeting point of Sunkoshi and Tamakoshi at Khurkot, Sindhuli of BP highway citing water level fluctuation during the assessment period. Ganesh Neupane, spokesperson of the project, said that, during the assessment period, activities like fishing, bathing, swimming, washing clothes, letting cattle in the river or going to the river for any reason have been prohibited.
He informed that the information in the offshore areas of the river has been flowed through the District Administration Office of Ramechhap and Dolakha, local level and police units.
