Could a $50bn plan to tame this mighty river bring electricity to all of Africa?

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Could a $50bn plan to tame this mighty river bring electricity to all of Africa?: "One of Africa's biggest electricity companies yesterday unveiled plans to build the world's biggest hydro-electricity plant on a stretch of the Congo River, harnessing enough power for the whole continent.

The proposed plant at the Inga Rapids, near the river's mouth in the western Democratic Republic of Congo, would cost $50bn (£26bn) and could generate some 40,000MW, twice the power of China's Three Gorges dam.

The river is seen as ideal. Known as the 'river that swallows all rivers', it is fed by 10,000 streams that funnel into powerful rapids along its 2,900-mile course.

Rather than damming up the river entirely, the plan by South Africa's state-owned power company, Eskom - which has already won over independent experts - involves creating a 'run-of-river' plant in which water is siphoned off, channelled through turbines and then fed back into the river...

"But critics say even run-of-river plants can damage the environment, by blocking the migratory path of fish and stalling the flow of silt downstream.

There are also fears that electricity from the project, dubbed 'Grand Inga', will simply enrich corporate backers rather than reach Africa's poorest, many of whom live beyond the electricity grids. [...]"