#3, Tarbela, Pakistan: 121,720 cubic meters
The Tarbela Dam is situated on the world’s largest river known as the Indus River. Tarbela Dam is one of the world’s biggest earth and rock filled Dam and supreme water resources expansion project which was completed in 1976 as a constituent part of Indus Basin Project. The project consists of a 9,000 feet long, 465 feet high above the river bed, earth and rock fill embankment across the entire width of the river with two spillways cutting through the left bank discharging into a side valley.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcOrciTLoB0[/youtube]
#2, Samara / Zhiguli Dam,Russia: 169,000,000 cubic meters
Samara Dam is located on the Volga River which is situated near Zhigulyovsk and Tolyatti in Samara Oblast of Russia. Samara is a very large dam and hydroelectric station. The lake appears to be under the control of one important government official for private use and for protection. Duck hunting is ordinary away from the dam and there is the option of the additional room of agriculture and of mineral taking out, but there are no other major intimidations evident. No protection actions are known to have been officially planned.
#1, Three Gorges, China: 39,300,000 cubic meters
The Three Gorges dam was one of the major projects of China, to improve their economy and generate humongous amount of hydroelectric power for its residents. It is a concrete dam, the dam is 2,335m long and the height above the sea level is 185m. The project utilized 27,200,000m3 of concrete, 463,000 tons of steel and about 102,600,000m3 of earth was evacuated to create the room for dam. The depth of the dam is 181m. A huge amount of investment was done in order to create the humongous dam, initially it was estimated that the dam will cost the Chinese government about 22.5 billion dollars but the circumstances did not allow this and the cost reached up to 27 billion dollars. It was estimated that the whole revenue or the cost of the dam will be generated in first ten years of fully functional dam with generation of 1,000 Twh of electricity yielding 250 billion Yuan.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6ioHuJOm3I[/youtube]
