Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam
Hydroelectric power plant in EthiopiaWikipedia
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Search complete. 29 mentions across 20 episodes found for "Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam".
Nov 3, 2026
Adam LucenteHOST
This comes after Sudan said Monday they filed a complaint with the United Nations Security Council against Ethiopia, accusing the country of enabling the rapid support forces, RSF rebels, to attack Sudan from Ethiopian territory.
Adam LucenteHOST
Tensions between Sudan and Ethiopia have been high for years over the latter's Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, which Sudan and Egypt believe threatens water levels in parts of the Nile River in their territories.
Adam LucenteHOST
But more recently, the tensions have risen over the current conflicts in both countries.
Adam LucenteHOST
Sudan alleged drone attacks from Ethiopia earlier this year as well, and Addis Ababa denied an accusation in May.
Victor KgomoesoanaGUEST
Those were colonial agreements, and whatever they say and do, they are never going to be able to get to enforce them.
Victor KgomoesoanaGUEST
The problem, though, is while they are going back and forth, arguing and discussing this, the Ethiopians are just filling up the grand Ethiopian Renaissance dam.
Victor KgomoesoanaGUEST
And it looks like they're just going to find that their decisions mean nothing because in the end, the demo will be full and there won't be anything to discuss.
Victor KgomoesoanaGUEST
But more bigger problems they have, especially Sudan, is that they are drone attacks on the water infrastructure in the Sudan.
Rotendo NdingwiGUEST
They are trying manufacturing entities.
Rotendo NdingwiGUEST
And one of the big things, obviously, with the Renaissance Dam, obviously, there was a huge conflict with Egypt.
Rotendo NdingwiGUEST
But again, the hydroelectric power that's coming from there and how that will stimulate the economy.
Rotendo NdingwiGUEST
So a lot of positive things.
Rutendo HwindingwiGUEST
They're trying manufacturing entities elsewhere.
Rutendo HwindingwiGUEST
And one of the big things, obviously, with the Renaissance Dam, obviously, there was a huge conflict with Egypt.
Rutendo HwindingwiGUEST
But again, the hydroelectric power that's coming from there and how that will stimulate the economy.
Rutendo HwindingwiGUEST
So a lot of positive things.
Cobus van StadenHOST
So – but those are still – You know, kind of thanks to these connections and some of these connections, these transnational transmission lines, China is also building.
Cobus van StadenHOST
So, you know, kind of between Ethiopia and various kind of neighboring countries, for example, you know, in trading from the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, like hydroelectricity to other countries.
Cobus van StadenHOST
So China is building some of these large projects and then also building some of the transmission networks.
Cobus van StadenHOST
And so we were kind of like raising recommendations for African countries on how they can kind of maximize this cooperation with China.
Daniel Dramani KipoGUEST
At the same time, when we even look at it, if you take a country like Saudi Arabia diplomatically and its relation with Iran is certainly not the best, and if you see these people in the same platform, we might be asking, why are we going with this contraction view? And so even the relation, diplomatic, foreign relation between Ethiopia and Egypt is not the best.
Daniel Dramani KipoGUEST
They have their disagreement with the construction of the Renaissance Dam in Ethiopia, and that affects Egypt.
Daniel Dramani KipoGUEST
And they have been putting it even African Union.
Daniel Dramani KipoGUEST
Egypt is not happy with Ethiopia.
Matt BrackenGUEST
But the northwestern part, if you see that dam, there's a dam up there called the GERD Dam.
Matt BrackenGUEST
That stands for the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam.
Matt BrackenGUEST
And it's massive.
Matt BrackenGUEST
It's like Hoover Dam.
14 MINS LATER
Matt BrackenGUEST
When you need it, you don't get it.
Matt BrackenGUEST
When you don't want it, we'll flood it.
Matt BrackenGUEST
And so to the Egyptians, this is like, you know, If the Egyptians have paratroop units like the 82nd Airborne, you can bet they practiced taking the Gerd Dam, Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam.
Matt BrackenGUEST
And it's named that Renaissance, like Phoenix up from the ashes.
John ColeGUEST
Um, as you said, this has something to do with the Nile.
John ColeGUEST
Um, the, uh, Ethiopians finished the, um, the GERD, the Great Ethiopian Renaissance Dam-
Hugo GoodridgeHOST
Yeah
John ColeGUEST
... um, which lies on the Blue Nile and essentially allows Ethiopia to control when and how water runs down towards both Sudan and Egypt.
Victor KgomoesoanaGUEST
You and I talk about this all the time, adding value to the gold rather than just exporting it as ore.
Victor KgomoesoanaGUEST
The, the essence of this is just like they did with the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, which is producing a lot of energy, but not for Ethiopia, but for the Horn of Africa and the East African countries.
Victor KgomoesoanaGUEST
The refinery is targeting neighboring countries that produce gold but don't have refinery capacity or refining capacity.
Victor KgomoesoanaGUEST
So it's a no-brainer.
Nick NorbrookGUEST
And that was the case for Ethiopia.
Nick NorbrookGUEST
It managed to finance the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, much to the chagrin of Cairo, and no doubt we'll talk about that later.
Nick NorbrookGUEST
But they financed it using the tricks of financial repression, which were used all across Asia, where essentially governments... forced savers to finance government projects.
Nick NorbrookGUEST
And it was very literal in the Ethiopian sense, I think, and no doubt people will correct me, but I think Ethiopian civil servants for a long time paid a month of salary each year to build this dam, and they managed to finance it with very little external financing.
Nick NorbrookGUEST
That sort of gives a sense of how disciplined they were.
Nick NorbrookGUEST
Now, the equivalent to, I guess, POSCO, the South Korean steel industry in Ethiopia, is METEC.
Nick NorbrookGUEST
And they were meant to be doing a lot of the machinery and engineering work around the Grand Renaissance Dam.
Nick NorbrookGUEST
They were meant to be doing a lot of the high-end manufacturing and be the vanguard of industrial transformation in Ethiopia.
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