Kaps water reservoir may save National Park "Arpi." Last year environmentalists alarms of lowering water level in Lake Sevan. In fact, two islands, where Dalmatian pelican and Armenian gulls put on the Red List of threatened species lay eggs, have turned into peninsulas. Environmentalists explain this with operation of the small HPP on the River of Akhuryan. Head of WWF-Armenia Karen Manvelyan told ArmInfo that the level of water in the lake keeps falling.
"We have applied to the Nature Protection Ministry and the Water Management Committee on the matter and they explained that water is released for irrigation purposes and not for HPP. As far as I known there is a project of restoration of the Kaps water storage on the River of Akhuryan, which will be funded by the German Government through KfW Bank. Hopefully, if implemented, the level of Arpli will become steady. I think that Kaps reservoir is the only solution to the problem," Manvelyan said.
National Park "Arpi" was officially opened in the autumn of 2012. The Park embraces mountain steppes, rivers, pre-alpine and highly mountainous alpine meadows. Earlier, this summer the Government of Armenia approved a draft agreement between Armenia and the Bank of Restoration Loans on financing of the Kaps reservoir (Shirak Region) restoration project. German KfW Bank expressed readiness to contribute to completion of the project of construction of the dam on the Kaps reservoir. Therefore, a contest for the project has been announced.
The cost of the project is 18.5 mln EUR. There is a bilateral agreement on provision of credit funds. At present, the German bank is ready to conduct a purpose-oriented study on the 350,000 EUR grant before the launch of the basic stage of the project.