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The Nile's water has affected the politics of East Africa and the Horn of Africa for many decades. The dispute between Egypt and Ethiopia over the $4.5 billion Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam has become a national preoccupation in both countries, stoking patriotism, deep-seated fears and even murmurs of war. [ 85 ]
The Upper Nile plant is the Egyptian lotus, and the Lower Nile plant is the Papyrus Sedge (Cyperus papyrus), although it is not nearly as plentiful as it once was, and is becoming quite rare. [20] Several hundred thousand water birds spend their winter in the delta, including the world's largest concentrations of little gulls and whiskered terns.
The main water supplier for the basin is Lake Victoria, located in the Great Rift Valley. [4] About 238 million people live within the Nile basin, 172 million of those inhabit rural localities. [5] In the southwestern part of the basin in South Sudan near the watershed with Congo Basin relief is made up a single large pediplain. [6]
Before the construction of the dam, water levels on Lake Victoria were moderated by a natural rock dam on the north side of the lake. Rising lake waters would spill over the natural dam into the White Nile, which flows through Uganda, South Sudan, Sudan, and Egypt before emptying into the Mediterranean Sea. When water levels dropped too low ...
A nilometer is a structure for measuring the Nile River's clarity and water level during the annual flood season in Egypt. [1] There were three main types of nilometers, calibrated in Egyptian cubits: (1) a vertical column, (2) a corridor stairway of steps leading down to the Nile, and (3) a deep well with a culvert. [1]
Before the construction of the High Dam, groundwater levels in the Nile Valley fluctuated 8–9 m (26–30 ft) per year with the water level of the Nile. During summer when evaporation was highest, the groundwater level was too deep to allow salts dissolved in the water to be pulled to the surface through capillary action.
It was designed with a maximum water level of 183 metres (600 ft) above sea level. As a precaution against any unexpected rise in Lake Nasser's water level, a spillway and channel were built in 1978. The channel has the potential to divert water from the reservoir to the Toshka basin, which is located outside the Nile basin.
The White Nile (Arabic: النيل الأبيض an-nīl al-'abyaḍ) is a river in Africa, the minor of the two main tributaries of the Nile, the larger being the Blue Nile. [4] The name "White" comes from the clay sediment carried in the water that changes the water to a pale color.