ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Local authorities and non-profit organizations are mobilizing to remove nearly 300 tons of plastic from Darbandikhan dam’s lake in Sulaimani province, representatives from NGOs told Rudaw on Thursday.
Vim Foundation, a Sulaimani-based non-profit organization, and the Darbandikhan municipality are currently working on cleaning the Darbandikhan dam lake from plastic waste before it overflows, trickling into the river as a result of this year’s heavy rains.
Kawyar Mohammed, head of projects at Vim foundation told Rudaw’s Hunar Hamid that Vim channeled all efforts “to clean the dam of all the waste before it overflows.”
She mentioned that they have removed over 75 tons of garbage and expect the total quantity of waste removed to reach 300 tons.
Darbandikhan Mayor Osman Abdullah pointed out that the collected garbage is transported with equipment provided by the municipality, highlighting the latter’s role in supporting the Vim Foundation’s mission.
“We have put our municipal equipment under their [Vim Foundation] command, for transporting this waste to the designated disposal site outside the municipal boundaries,” Abdullah said.
The Darbandikhan dam, inaugurated in 1961 on the Sirwan River, is one of Kurdistan Region and Iraq’s many dams, which supplies electricity to several cities and regulates water supplies to vast farmlands in Garmiyan and central Iraq.
The dam also serves as a touristic destination for the residents of Sulaimani province in the spring. However, as a result of unsustainable tourism practices the dam is currently overflowing with waste disposed of by littering tourists into the lake.
Currently, the dam is only 23 centimeters away from overflowing, according to Saman Ismail, the director of the Darbandikhan dam. The last time the dam overflowed was in the spring of 2019.
Around six billion cubic meters of water are currently held in the dams across the Kurdistan Region, which is 1.8 billion cubic meters more compared to this time last year, Rahman Khani, head of the general dam directorate, told Rudaw’s Soran Hussein earlier this month.
There are three large dams and 20 small and medium-sized dams in the Kurdistan Region. The three largest dams: Dukan, Darbandikhan, and Duhok have a combined capacity of 10 billion cubic meters of water.
