Armenian Hydroelectric Power Plants Not Affected by Aridity: Environmentalist

The total annual amount of precipitation in Armenia decreased by only 2 centimeters in 2014, however, 340 million cubic meters of water was released from Lake Sevan, which is twice as much as permitted, environmentalist Knarik Hovhannisyan said in an interview with Epress.am. Due to drainage from Lake Sevan, Hovhannisyan added, last year's aridity did not affect flow rate of rivers as much, so it could not have caused standstill in hydroelectric power stations. 

The environmentalist recalled that last year the Armenian Government passed amendments to legislation to increase annual water outlets from Lake Sevan for agricultural purposes in the Ararat plain. The drainage also increased flow rate of rivers which are used to generate electricity by hydro-power. As a result, as of January 1, 2015 the level of Lake Sevan has decreased by 9 centimeters as compared to the same period of the previous year.

Note, Robert Nazaryan, Chairman of the RA Public Services Regulatory Commission, justified the nearly 7-dram increase in Armenian electricity rates by aridity in 2013 and in 2014, as a result of which, according to Nazaryan, hydroelectric power stations generated less electricity. 

“Hydroelectric power stations operating on [rivers not supplied by Lake Sevan] were not affected that much either. In particular, there are twelve hydro-power plants on river Yeghegis. These plants did not use water resources of Lake Sevan and they still operated unobstructedly. The things is, water from Kechut reservoir should have gone to Lake Sevan through Arpa-Sevan tunnel; however, the water was supplied to river Yeghegis instead,” Hovhannisyan said.