Tharthar Scheme
Interbasin transfer, 9,000 m3/s Tharthar regulator through 36 openings; 82 km3 lake storage at 65 m a.s.l.; 65 km Tharthar canal; outlet regulator of 1,100 m3/s; Tharthar-Tigris canal 600 m3/s and Tharthar-Euphrates canal 500 m3/s in Iraq.
Operational
The record
- Country
- Iraq
- Location
- Samarra
- Coordinates
- —
- Technology
- Interbasin transfer
- Capacity
- 9,000 m3/s Tharthar regulator through 36 openings; 82 km3 lake storage at 65 m a.s.l.; 65 km Tharthar canal; outlet regulator of 1,100 m3/s; Tharthar-Tigris canal 600 m3/s and Tharthar-Euphrates canal 500 m3/s
- Capital cost
- —
- Stage
- Operational
- Owner or client
- Ministry of Water Resources
- Contractor
- Zueblin (civil works); Ransomes and Rapier (hydro-mechanical works)
- Operator
- Ministry of Water Resources
- Finance
- Development Board (oil revenues)
- Award or start year
- 1953
- Commissioned
- 1956-04
Record last checked 2026-09-18.
History
- 1953
works started
- 1956-04
Samarra Barrage and the Tharthar regulator opened and the lake began filling
- 1972
construction of the Tharthar outlet regulator started at the southern edge of the lake
- 1976
outlet regulator opened and water first returned to the Euphrates
- 1991
two regulator gates isolated to feed the Irwaiyah canal
Sources
9 references
Every field in the record above is taken from the references below. A field that none of them confirms prints as a dash.
- Mukhalad Abdullah, Nadhir Al-Ansari and Jan Laue, Water Resources Projects in Iraq, Reservoirs in The Natural Depressions, Journal of Earth Sciences and Geotechnical Engineering 9(4) 2019, pp. 137-152. diva-portal.org.
- The Tharthar project diverts Tigris flood waves away from Baghdad into the Tharthar depression and returns stored water to both rivers.
- Components are Samarra Barrage, the Tharthar regulator and canal, the Irwaiyah canal, the Tharthar outlet regulator, the division regulator, the Tharthar-Tigris and Tharthar-Euphrates canals and Tharthar Lake.
- The regulator has 36 openings of 7 m by 12 m and a maximum discharge of 9,000 m3/s, feeding the lake through a 65 km canal.
- Lake maximum capacity is 82 billion m3 at 65 m a.s.l., with a surface of 1,600 km2 at the outlet regulator sill of 40 m a.s.l. rising to 2,700 km2 at maximum level, and evaporation at maximum capacity of 7.4 billion m3 per year.
- The outlet regulator was started in 1972 and opened in 1976 with six openings and a maximum discharge of 1,100 m3/s.
- Water first reached the Euphrates through the Tharthar-Euphrates canal in 1976. In 1991 two regulator gates were isolated to feed the 97 km Irwaiyah canal at 250 m3/s.
- Mukhalad Abdullah, Nadhir Al-Ansari and Jan Laue, Water Resources Projects in Iraq: Barrages, Journal of Earth Sciences and Geotechnical Engineering 9(4) 2019, pp. 153-167. diva-portal.org.
- MENA Water Review major projects register and PPP pipeline — compiled from procurer publications, development-bank project pages and trade reporting; each record names its source.