Rila Monastery Nature Park Management Plan - part - usaid

February 2004
The residence of Archimandrite Theodossius
Located in Bachkova Cheshma locality, the residential complex consists of three
stone buildings. Property of the Holy Monastery of Rila
Hydropower and water supply facilities
Within the territory of Rila Monastery Nature Park there are two whole separate
systems of facilities and installations for the catchment, storage and supply of
mountain water. One system, located in the Kalin section of the Park, consists of two
reservoirs and a network of surface canals for catching water during spring thaw,
which is then fed by gravity pipeline into Kalin Hydropower Station. The used water
is discharged from the powerhouse into a cooling pool, into which thaw waters are
fed via two additional pipes. From there, water is fed again by gravity to the next
powerhouse within the system, Kamenitza Hydropower Station, in the near vicinity of
the Park, by the Pastra-to-Kalin road.
The other hydrotechnical system constitutes part of the Balmakan-Sestrimo cascade
of power stations, which covers the entire Rila Mountain. Two of its branches cut
across the Nature Park, in the upper reaches of the Rilska and Iliyna River
watersheds. These are catchment facilities and canals for collecting thaw waters and
underground tunnels for feeding them into the Beli Iskar Dam.
Water reservoirs
The construction of Kalin Dam was begun in 1939; it was followed shortly thereafter
by a smaller facility, Malak (Lesser) Kalin; both dams were put on stream in 1948.
Both are small, with a combined capacity of 1.04 million m³, and serve to capture the
thaw waters in the watershed of the Kamenitza and Kalin Rivers (see Table 8 in
Chapter 2.3.3).
Deviations, collectors and canals
In 1965, the blueprints for the Belmeken-Sestrimo cascade of power stations were
approved; by 1969, a project was developed to collect additional waters for the
cascade. This project envisioned the building of several additional collectors:
Manastirska-Beli Iskar, Iliyna-Left, Iliyna-Right and Blagoevgradska Bistritza,
designed to deviate an additional 71.61m cu.m of water from the watersheds of the
Stourma and Iskar Rivers into the Belmeken-Sestrimo catchment area. These
additional quantities of water were expected to help generate an extra 2,470m
kW/hours of electricity. The Manastirska, Iliyna-Left and Iliyna-Right collectors are
built within the perimeter of RMNP at elevations slightly over 2,000m asl, the
combined watershed of these covering an area of 53.7 km².
The Manastirska collector covers the territory from the Cherney Ridge and ends at
Lake Smradlivo. It catches the waters of the Rilska River, which has its source at
Ribni Lakes at elevation 2,220 m, and its left-hand tributaries by means of the
Gyolski tunnel, and the Smradliva, Dyavolska and Vodnitza Rivers and their righthand
tributaries by means of a pipe canal. The combined water catchment area for
Rila Monastery Nature Park
Management Plan -Draft
2004 - 2013
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