article_snippet: (CNN)It's called the Grand Renaissance Dam -- and the clue is in the name.
article_snippet: With some 8,500 laborers working around the clock on its construction, the $5bn Grand Renaissance Dam is surely one of Africa's most ambitious infrastructure projects, reaffirming Ethiopia's ambitions of becoming a big regional player and a major exporter of power.
article_snippet: When completed, the project will generate around 6,000 megawatts of electricity for both domestic use and exports.
article_snippet: Hydroelectric powerhouse .
article_snippet: So far, Ethiopians at home and abroad have contributed about $350 million, and the government says that the 170 meter tall dam is on track for a 2017 opening, with 40% of the work already complete.
article_snippet: If the Grand Renaissance Dam and other hydroelectric projects, such as the Gibe III dam on the Omo river, are completed on time, The World Bank estimates Ethiopia could earn $1 billion a year from electricity exports.
article_snippet: The Grand Renaissance Dam is being built on Blue Nile, a tributary of the Nile River which has been powering the agriculture of Sudan and Egypt -- through which The Grand Renaissance Dam flows -- for millennia.
article_snippet: This is actually a regional project because up from Egypt all the way down to Rwanda, countries are going to buy the power that's generated by The Grand Renaissance Dam," Negatu says, adding that both Rwanda and Kenya have already agreed to purchase thousands of megawatts once a regional project is finished.
article_snippet: Industrialization has always been about electricity, and this [dam] addresses this basic need.
highlights_snippet: Ethiopia is building the largest hydro-electric dam in Africa .
  
highlights_snippet: Ethiopia says the $5bn Grand Renaissance Dam is funded entirely by the government and Ethiopia people .
  