The Gabčíkovo – Nagymaros Dams (more precisely Gabčíkovo - Nagymaros Waterworks, Hungarian: Bős–nagymarosi vízlépcső, Slovak: Sústava vodných diel Gabčíkovo - Nagymaros) is a large barrage project on the Danube. It was initiated by the Budapest Treaty of 16 September 1977 between Czechoslovakia and Hungary. Its purposes are to prevent catastrophic floods, to improve river navigability and to produce clean electricity. Only a part of the project has been finished in Slovakia, under the name Gabčíkovo Dam/Waterworks, because Hungary unilaterally abandoned construction. This caused a still unresolved international dispute between Slovakia and Hungary.
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The joint Hungarian-Czechoslovak project was agreed upon on 16 September 1977 in the "Budapest Treaty". The treaty envisioned a cross-border barrage system between the towns of Gabčíkovo, Slovakia (after January 1, 1993 independent Slovak Republic) and Nagymaros, Hungary. The dams would eliminate regular floodings (like the disastrous ones of 1954 and 1965) and provide a clean source of electric power. They would also allow year-long navigability of the river and serve as a part of the Rhine-Main-Danube Canal system of inland navigation.
The plan was to divert part of the river into an artificial canal at Dunakiliti (a village in Hungary) to the hydroelectric power plant near Gabčíkovo (eight turbines, 720 MW). The canal would return the water into a deepened original riverbed and at Nagymaros a smaller dam and power-plant (158 MW) would be constructed. The plant in Gabčíkovo was to be a peak-power plant and the dam in Nagymaros, about 100 km downstream, was to limit fluctuations of the water level.
Because most of the construction was planned to occur in Slovak territory, the Hungarian government was obligated to participate in some construction in Slovakia, to ensure equal investment by both sides. Electricity produced was to be shared equally between the two countries.
In 1981 Hungary asked for a slowdown of the project because of economic problems. In 1984 a movement protesting against the dam, the "Danube Circle" (Duna Kör), was founded in Hungary. The group objected to the withholding of information on the project from the public by the Communist government to avoid debate on its environmental impact. In addition to a lack of information, the argument against the dam was danger to the environment and to the water supply of Budapest. After an intensive campaign the project became widely hated in Hungary as a symbol of the old regime. In Slovakia, construction continued and many people were involved in building the hydro-electric plant. In 1989, when most of the project on the Slovak side had been constructed, the Hungarian government decided to suspend it, without informing the government of Czechoslovakia. This was regarded very negatively there.
After discussion among experts in Czechoslovakia about what to do with the construction site, 7 proposals were put forward in 1992.
| Proposal | Description | Result |
|---|---|---|
| A | Complete the original plans from 1977 together with Hungary - marked as the best option, but not realistic | |
| B | Complete only the Czechoslovak part of the waterworks. | |
| C | Reduce the reservoir, build the waterworks only on the territory of the Slovak Republic and postpone construction at Nagymaros in Hungary. Split the shared reservoir into two with a dam and instead of the dam in Dunakiliti build a dam in Čunovo. This variant is called temporal, due to it is technically possible to build a Dunakiliti dam and flood Čunovo dam in order to finish waterworks according to 1977 treaty. | winning project |
| D | Complete only the upper part of the dam and finish the Dunakiliti dam. | |
| E | Use the waterworks only for flood prevention and to ensure navigability. | |
| F | Stop construction and retain the site in its current state. | |
| G | Remove all improvements and return the river to its original state. | Demanded by Hungary, but not realistic, because 90% of the project was finished in Slovakia. |
In the end it was decided to switch to an alternative solution on a smaller scale, Proposal C. The artificial canal would start at Čunovo, part of the Slovak capital city Bratislava, and the Gabčíkovo power plant would operate in run-of-the-river mode with no water level fluctuation. Construction started in November 1991. In October 1992 diversion of part of the water into the canal started and the Čunovo reservoir was filled; the secondary structures (such as the power-plant) were finished and made operational in 1996.
The waterworks on the Danube were designed to have an additional level at Nagymaros, consisting of a reservoir 95 km long and the Nagymaros power plant. This level was to be located between the Hungarian towns of Visegrád and Nagymaros and its purpose was to use the gradient of the reservoir for production of electricity and also to allow ships to pass. The Gabčíkovo works were designed for control and peak running of the power plant, and the Nagymaros works as an equalising power plant to provide better conditions for shipping and to regulate peak outflow from Gabčíkovo. Because the Nagymaros works were not built, the Gabčíkovo power plant cannot work at peak efficiency, which causes appreciable economic damage. Non-existence of Nagymaros dam also causes main obstacle of inland navigation on the 2400 km Danube Pan-European corridor due to low levels of water. Hungary requests Slovakia to manage regulation works on problematic stretch of Danube that had to be solved by Nagymaros backwater. Transportation damages include also missing upgrade of river Váh waterway in Slovakia.
In 1989 Hungary abandoned the site and in May 1992 tried to terminate the 1977 treaty. After Czechoslovakia split up in 1993, the newly established Slovak Republic, as inheritor of the project, submitted the dispute to the International Court of Justice in The Hague. In 1994, the Socialists came back into power in Hungary but could hardly back out of the court case, which was hailed as a landmark: for the first time, the court would rule over an environmental dispute. Hearings on the case were held between 3 March and 15 April 1997, and the Court paid a site visit (the first ever in its history). Besides other issues, the Hungarian representatives wanted the court to decide whether or not Czechoslovakia was entitled to embark on Proposal C, and to rule that the 1977 treaty was not binding on Slovakia and Hungary. The court handed down a decision in 1997:
Another 4 months of negotiations between Slovakia and Hungary led to a treaty between the two countries about the ICJ judgment. In March 1998 the government of Slovakia approved this treaty, but the government of Hungary, which was supposed to build Nagymaros or a Pilismarót waterworks, delayed approving the treaty and proclaimed a competition for the project. After elections in Hungary, the new government cancelled this competition.[1] In 1998, after two appeals to Hungary, the Slovak government turned to the International Court, demanding the Nagymaros part be built. As of 2006, the international dispute was still not resolved.[2]
The threatened ecological catastrophe did not materialise during the following years; on the contrary, the Waterworks fixed several environmental problems in the region:
The switchyard of the power station is disguised on Google Maps [1].