The Iron Gates I Hydroelectric Power Plant - Romania-Serbia - a great partnership
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The "Iron Gates I" Hydro- Energetic and Navigation System which stands as a symbol of the Romanian energetics and result of the Romanian-Yugoslavian collaboration, was inaugurated at the 16th of May 1972. The “Iron Gates I” Hydro-electric Power Station Museum opened in 1976 and presents the Danube’s general characteristics, hydrologic data, material proofs of the human settlements of the region.
The building works of the Hydro- Energetic and Navigation System of the "Iron Gates" officially started at the 7th of September 1964.
This construction is symmetrical and identical, with two hydro-electrical stations separated by the spillway dam, having 441 m in length and 14 overflowing apertures, the dam’s height being of 74 m.
The accumulation lake formed by the dam has over 2 milliards m3 of water and a length of 120 km.
The ships pass through the two sluices which were built symmetrical to the dam’s axe. The sluicing system is built in two stages respecting the communicating vessels principle (the difference in altitude of the water is of 30 m).
Before the construction of the Hydro-electric Power Station of Iron Gates, the complex collective of the Romanian Academy deeply researched the area of the future accumulation lake of “Iron Gates I". A part of these researches was exposed to the public within the exhibition. The region of the Iron Gates Defile was inhabited ever since the Palaeolithic. The researches settled that here developed two new archaeological cultures: Schela Cladovei in Epipalaeolithic and Insula Banului in the first Iron stage. The exhibition underlines the fact that the human communities inhabited this region ever since 30.000 years ago to our days. This reality is evinced by a rich ceramics which belong to different archaeological cultures.
Along the time, this region was claimed by the military forces of this part of the Danube. During the Roman era this area played an important role. Fortified with numerous entrenchments, it represented the starting point of the war against the Dacian state. In order to have control over this region, the Romans built a road on the Danube’s southern shore, often cut in stone, and on the stream they sent a naval force. The fire weapons of the exhibition suggest the war fought by the local population against the invaders. The first monastic settlement of Tara Romaneasca belonged to the Vodita Monastery. The monastery was built by the Serb monk Nicodim in the XIV-th century and represented the centre of the orthodoxy which withstood to the Catholicism’s penetration in the region.
A part of the Iron Gates was claimed by the two great empires of the time: The Hapsburg and Ottoman Empire. This is why the Austrians built a fortification of Vauban type on the Ada-Kaleh Island but the island passed under Ottoman possession and a Turk community established here. After the First World War the statute of this population was not clear.
In 1923, the representatives of the Turk community requested to the Romanian state to take over the island. Till the island was flooded by the waters of the “Iron Gates I” accumulation lake, the main occupation of the population used to be the tourism, the most wanted products being the rose and fig jam, Turkish delight and cigarettes.
During the appearance of the accumulation lake, 7 localities were moved on the Serbian shore and 10 on the Romanian side (Orsova, Ada-Kaleh, Ogradena, Varciorova, Tisovita, Plavisevita, etc.).
In memory of the Ada-Kaleh Island, it was arranged a Turkish interior comprising pieces representative to the Turk population of this island placed at the interference of the Hapsburg and Ottoman Empire.
The museum exhibits folk costumes specific to the Iron Gates region and a water mill, considered to be the precursor of the modern turbine, Pelton
The biologic diversity, complexity of the geologic sub-layer and cultural values make from the Iron Gates region a place with international scientific reputation.
The Iron Gates Defile is considered to be an open air geologic museum. Here exists a variety of magmatic, metamorphic and sedimentary rocks. The rocks specific to the Iron Gates are remarkable: the grit stone of Gura Vaii, urgonian limestone of Cazanele Dunarii, granite of Ogradena, serpentines of Tisovita and Plavisevita.
Due to the richness of the flora and fauna, the Danube’s way in the region of the Iron Gates is declared: Sit Natura 2000.
The incursion into the “Iron Gates I” Hydro-electric Power Station Museum ends with the Hall of Turbines where the visitor can admire the 6 Kaplan turbines, each of them having a 194,5 MW installed power.
A turbine weights 3680 t. the turbine’s axe has a length of 18 m and 71.5 rotations per minute. To its inferior end there is installed the hub with its 6 blades (each blade weighing 20 t). The generator’s rotor has 600 t in weight and 14 m diameter. The average water fall is of 27.5 m and the necessary flow capacity for each turbine is of 800 m3/s. The electric current which is produced by the turbines is passed to the 6 power transformers and then it is conducted to the connexion stations.
The “Iron Gates I” Hydro-electric Power Station is the largest in Romania, it producing 50% out of the country’s hydro-energy