Alcántara Dam

The Alcántara Dam, also known as the José María de Oriol Dam, is a buttress dam on the Tagus River near Alcántara in the province of Cáceres, Spain. It is named after the politician and captain of the Spanish electricity industry José María de Oriol y Urquijo. The dam regulates much of the flow of the Tagus River, the longest of the Iberian Peninsula. It was built in 1969 and is the second largest reservoir in Western Europe.^[3][4] In 2024, a pumped-storage project was approved to use the Alcántara reservoir as the upper reservoir, and Cedillo as the lower, with around 100 m height difference serving two reversible turbines at a combined 440 MW.^[5]

Alcántara Dam
Location of Alcántara Dam in Spain
Location	Alcántara, province of Cáceres, Extremadura, Spain
Coordinates	39°43′48″N 6°53′05″W
Status	Operational
Opening date	1969
Dam and spillways
Type of dam	Buttress
Height	130 m (427 ft)
Length	570 m (1,870 ft)
Dam volume	956,000 m3 (1,250,401 cu yd)
Spillways	2
Spillway capacity	8,000 m3/s (282,517 cu ft/s)
Reservoir
Total capacity	3,160,000,000 m3 (2,561,854 acre⋅ft)
Catchment area	51,916 km2 (20,045 sq mi)[1]
Power Station
Commission date	1969-1970
Turbines	4 x 229 MW Francis-type
Installed capacity	915 MW[2]

The Roman Alcántara Bridge is located 600 m downstream from the dam.