Run-of-river hydropower schemes tend to be less disrupting, but even they can involve diversions which affect other water users (OECD EAP Task Force, 2012b). The same is true for withdrawals for cooling in thermal power and industrial plants, where volumes of water are typically very large, and with the added impact caused by the release of water at higher temperatures into recipient water bodies (World Bank, 2014). There is no justification for the current practice in Georgia of treating the abstraction of irrigation water on the same footing as thermal power cooling for the purpose of levying abstraction charges.