Overview
Hydropower is one of Syria’s oldest and most important renewable energy sources. Most of the country’s hydroelectric capacity is concentrated at facilities located along the Euphrates River, particularly the Euphrates Dam power station, also known as the Tabqa or Al-Thawra power station, the Tishreen Dam power station, and the Baath Dam, also referred to as the Freedom Dam.
These facilities perform several functions beyond electricity generation. They support water storage, river-flow regulation, irrigation, agriculture, flood management, and the wider management of Syria’s water resources.
Installed or nominal capacity must, however, be distinguished from available and operational capacity. Installed capacity represents the design rating of the turbines and generators, but it does not mean that the entire capacity is available to the electricity system at all times.
Actual generation depends on river inflows, reservoir levels, the technical condition of turbines and generators, maintenance requirements, sedimentation, dam operating rules, and wider electricity-system conditions.
Hydropower capacity in Syria
Data reported by the International Renewable Energy Agency indicate that Syria had approximately 1,545 megawatts of installed hydropower capacity in 2025.
Total installed renewable-energy capacity was approximately 3,806 megawatts in the same year. Based on these figures, hydropower represented around 40.6% of the country’s total reported renewable capacity.
Reported hydropower capacity remained at approximately 1,490 megawatts from 2017 through 2024, before increasing to 1,545 megawatts in 2025.
The reported increase of approximately 55 megawatts should not automatically be interpreted as newly commissioned operational capacity. It may reflect a statistical revision, an updated national inventory, or the reclassification of existing facilities.
The increase therefore requires confirmation against Syrian plant-level records and information on individual generating units.
Hydropower generation
Syria generated approximately 686 gigawatt-hours of hydropower electricity in 2024, according to the available preliminary data.
Total renewable electricity generation was approximately 862 gigawatt-hours during the same year. Hydropower therefore accounted for around 79.6% of the country’s reported renewable electricity generation.
Annual production data show substantial variation in hydropower output. Generation reached approximately 1,919 gigawatt-hours in 2019 and declined to around 1,613 gigawatt-hours in 2020.
Output fell to approximately 422 gigawatt-hours in 2021, before increasing to around 688 gigawatt-hours in 2022. Generation then declined sharply to approximately 188 gigawatt-hours in 2023 and recovered to a preliminary 686 gigawatt-hours in 2024.
This variation demonstrates that installed capacity alone cannot be used to evaluate the contribution of hydropower to Syria’s electricity system.
Although reported nominal capacity remained relatively stable during most of the period, actual electricity generation changed significantly from one year to another.
The principal determining factors include water availability, reservoir levels, inflows, the technical availability of generating units, maintenance conditions, and operational constraints affecting the power plants and the electricity network.
Euphrates Dam power station
The Euphrates Dam power station is located on the Euphrates River near the city of Tabqa in Raqqa Governorate. It is also known as the Tabqa or Al-Thawra power station.
Its historical nominal capacity is approximately 800 megawatts, making it Syria’s largest hydropower facility by design capacity.
The dam and its power station form a major component of Syria’s electricity and water infrastructure. In addition to electricity generation, the facility supports water storage, river regulation, irrigation, and agricultural activities.
The plant’s nominal capacity does not necessarily reflect its current operational capacity. Determining the available and operating capacity requires recent unit-level information covering turbine and generator condition, outages, maintenance status, and actual performance.
Tishreen Dam power station
The Tishreen Dam power station is located on the Euphrates River in the Aleppo countryside and has a historical nominal capacity of approximately 630 megawatts.
It is Syria’s second-largest hydropower facility by design capacity and forms an important part of the chain of dams and water infrastructure along the Euphrates River.
Its electricity generation is affected by upstream river flows, reservoir levels, water-management requirements, and the technical condition of its mechanical and electrical equipment.
As with other Syrian power stations, there is no comprehensive and regularly published public dataset showing the plant’s current operational capacity or the status and production of each generating unit.
Baath Dam or Freedom Dam power station
The Baath Dam is located on the Euphrates River in Raqqa Governorate, downstream from the Euphrates Dam. It has also been referred to as the Freedom Dam.
The facility has a historical nominal generating capacity of approximately 75 megawatts.
In addition to electricity generation, the dam performs an important regulatory function by managing water released from the Euphrates Dam.
Although it is smaller than the Euphrates and Tishreen power stations, it remains an integrated component of the Euphrates River’s water-management and hydropower system.
Smaller hydropower facilities
Historical references indicate that Syria also had several smaller hydropower facilities in different locations, with a combined nominal capacity of approximately 23 megawatts.
Available information concerning the present condition of these facilities is limited. There is no current public database identifying their exact locations, unit configurations, operational status, or actual electricity generation.
These capacities should therefore be classified as historical data until they are verified through official records or updated field assessments.
Installed and available capacity
A historical World Bank assessment reported approximately 1,528 megawatts of nominal hydropower capacity in Syria in 2007, while only around 1,151 megawatts was considered available at the time.
This difference illustrates why installed capacity should not be treated as permanently available or dependable capacity.
Available capacity depends on the number of generating units technically ready to operate, equipment condition, water availability, reservoir levels, and operating restrictions.
Operational capacity refers to the capacity that is actually running during a specific period. It may be lower than available capacity because of electricity demand, grid constraints, dispatch decisions, or water-management requirements.
Syrian Renewables therefore distinguishes between installed capacity, available capacity, operational capacity, and actual electricity generation.
Importance to the Syrian electricity system
Hydropower remains an important component of Syria’s renewable generation base, despite the rapid expansion of solar-energy systems.
Hydropower plants can theoretically provide more controllable electricity generation than variable renewable sources such as solar and wind. When water and equipment are available, they can contribute to meeting peak demand, balancing the electricity system, and providing operational flexibility.
This flexibility is nevertheless constrained by water-management priorities, drinking-water requirements, irrigation demand, reservoir conditions, and river inflows.
The strategic value of dams should not be evaluated solely through electricity production. These facilities are also connected to water security, food security, agriculture, and environmental management.
Their operation should therefore be coordinated through an integrated approach covering energy, water, agriculture, and environmental policy.
Water and climate challenges
The Euphrates River basin faces increasing pressure from variable precipitation, drought, higher temperatures, increased evaporation, and long-term climate change.
Water availability is also affected by upstream use and regional arrangements governing transboundary river flows.
Reduced river inflows directly limit the amount of electricity that can be generated. Even when turbines and generators are technically available, they cannot operate at full output without sufficient water flow and hydraulic head.
Low reservoir levels may also require operators to prioritize drinking water, irrigation, or minimum environmental flows over electricity generation.
Technical condition and rehabilitation
Syria’s electricity and water infrastructure experienced extensive damage during the conflict. Hydropower facilities have also faced constraints related to limited maintenance, shortages of spare parts, insufficient financing, and the loss of technical expertise.
The main hydropower plants require comprehensive technical assessments at the level of each generating unit.
These assessments should cover turbines, generators, transformers, control systems, protection systems, grid-connection equipment, spillway gates, measurement systems, and communication infrastructure.
Civil structures, tunnels, water intakes, drainage systems, and related dam facilities should also be inspected.
Rehabilitation should not be limited to replacing damaged equipment. It should include modernization of monitoring and control systems, efficiency improvements, preventive-maintenance programs, and digital records of outages and technical performance.
Sedimentation and dam safety
Sediment accumulation in reservoirs can reduce effective storage capacity, affect water intakes, lower operational efficiency, and increase long-term technical risks.
Regular surveys are needed to measure reservoir depth and sediment distribution and to assess how sedimentation affects the useful life of each facility, water-management capacity, and electricity generation.
Dam-safety management should include continuous monitoring systems, measurements of seepage, movement and pressure, and clearly defined emergency-response plans for floods or major technical failures.
Operational data limitations
There is currently no unified and regularly updated public database providing the operational status of every hydropower generating unit in Syria.
Important missing data include available capacity by plant, operational capacity, the number of unavailable units, outage causes, operating hours, monthly electricity generation, river inflows, reservoir levels, unit efficiency, and rehabilitation and maintenance plans.
This information gap limits the ability to evaluate hydropower’s current contribution to electricity security, identify priority investments, or estimate the capacity that could be recovered through rehabilitation.
Reported installed capacity should therefore be treated as an indicator of the size of Syria’s hydropower assets rather than a direct measure of the capacity currently dependable for the electricity system.
Rehabilitation and development priorities
The first priority is to conduct an independent technical audit of every major hydropower plant and generating unit. The audit should determine technical condition, available capacity, rehabilitation requirements, investment costs, and expected implementation periods.
A rehabilitation program should then be prepared for turbines, generators, transformers, control systems, and protection equipment.
Generating units should be prioritized according to rehabilitation cost, the amount of capacity that can be restored, operational importance, and implementation time.
Monitoring, control, communication, and data-transfer systems should also be modernized and integrated with national grid-control and coordination centres.
Other priorities include regular dam-safety assessments, sediment surveys, improved early-warning systems, and updated emergency-management plans.
A transparent public system should be established to publish plant-level electricity generation, reservoir levels, unit availability, and planned and unplanned outages.
Such a system would improve transparency, support system planning, and provide useful information for researchers, investors, public authorities, and development institutions.
Hydropower operations should also be coordinated among the authorities responsible for electricity, water, irrigation, agriculture, and the environment.
Small hydropower opportunities
Syria may have limited opportunities for small hydropower projects along irrigation canals, water-management facilities, water networks, and locations with suitable differences in elevation.
These locations should not be classified as viable projects before detailed assessments of water availability, seasonal flows, economic feasibility, environmental impacts, and grid connection are completed.
Small-hydropower potential should not be overstated, particularly given water scarcity and increasing competition among water users.
The most suitable projects may be those that use existing water flows in irrigation canals or water networks without requiring large new dams or placing additional pressure on water resources.
Data methodology
This page presents installed capacity separately from available capacity, operational capacity, and actual electricity generation.
The national installed hydropower capacity reported for 2025 is classified as high-confidence data because it is based on published international statistics.
The electricity-generation figure for 2024 is preliminary and may be revised in later statistical releases.
The nominal capacities of Syria’s principal hydropower plants are classified as verified historical values, but they should not be interpreted as measurements of current operational capacity.
The present operating capacity of individual plants and generating units remains unverified until detailed and updated official Syrian data become available.
Syrian Renewables is developing a database of Syria’s dams and hydropower facilities to document their location, installed capacity, operational status, water-related functions, electricity generation, maintenance and rehabilitation activities, sources, and data-quality classifications.