North Crimean Canal

(full name, Ukrainian Komsomol North Crimean Canal), a canal in the Ukrainian SSR that delivers water from the Dnieper River to the northern and eastern regions of the Crimea. The canal originates in the Ka-khovka Reservoir and runs along the Perekop Isthmus to Kerch’. Construction was begun in 1961; in 1963 water was conveyed to Krasnoperekopsk, in 1965 to Dzhankoi, and in 1971 to Kerch’. The canal is 402.6 km long and has a capacity at the headworks of 294 cu m/sec. The first leg of the canal (208.9 km) flows by gravity; four-step machine lifts work to raise the water level in the remaining sections (8, 25.7, 67, and 36 m). Offshoots of the North Crimean Canal include the Krasnoz-namensk Canal and five major irrigation and water-supply branches—the Razdol’noe, Krasnogvardeiskoe, and Cherno-morskoe canals and the Azovskoe and Razdol’noe rice irrigation canals—having a total length of 300 km. The Chaplino irrigation system (17,200 hectares [ha]) is also supplied from the North Crimean Canal.

The area irrigated and supplied with water by the North Crimean Canal totals 1,580,000 ha. Water for irrigation is first provided to areas in the Sivash Lowland, along the southern and southeastern shores of Karkinitskii Bay, in the central part of the Crimean steppe region, and on the Tarkhankut Plateau; these areas total 184,700 ha.

The North Crimean Canal supplies water to such cities as Feodosiia and Kerch’, to other populated areas, and to industrial zones. Five reservoirs, 126 irrigation pumping plants, and 256 other major hydraulic-engineering installations have been built to ensure a steady supply of water. Remote control of hydraulic valves and gates and automatic control of the larger pumping plants is being introduced. A network of wasteways is being built to cope with a rise in the level of the ground water in the canal zone.

Water resources in the northern and eastern Crimea and the delivery of water to irrigation systems have been significantly enlarged by the North Crimean Canal. The canal is not navigable.