Harnessing all of Nepal´s hydropower resource would require the building of about 60 run-of-river power plants and 30 reservoir/dam projects in the middle hills. The construction of the high dams and reservoirs would, among other things, require the re-drawing of the physical map of Nepal to show the large bodies of water which would become part and parcel of the Mahabharat and Churia landscape.
Seven of the 30 reservoir/dams proposed—in various studies and reports over the last four decades—would be between 50-100 meters in height; 12 would be between 100-200 m; and 11 of the ´high dams´ would be of more than 200 m.
Upon completion, the 90-odd projects would generate about 145,000 GWh (giga-watt hours) of electricity annually. The energy produced would be sufficient to meet the needs of´700 million average-sized South Asian families. If one were to complete all the projects and export the energy, it would provide the Nepali state with millions of dollars revenue every year. Irrigation for millions of hectares in the Ganga plain, command area development, regional flood mitigation, and navigation would be the additional benefits.
Construction of these projects would require about five million tons of steel, 100 million cubic metres of concrete, and 1000 million cu m of "rip-rap rocks" and filler materials gouged from nearby hills and mountains. Several hundred kilo-metres of conduits would have to be tunneled through the mountainsides. (For comparison´s sake.