Confluencia is a department located in the east of

Neuquén Province Neuquén () is a Provinces of Argentina, province of Argentina, located in the west of the country, at the northern end of Patagonia. It borders Mendoza Province to the north, Rio Negro Province to the southeast, and Chile to the west. It also me ...

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

Neuquén Neuquén (; ) is the capital city of the Argentine province of Neuquén and of the Confluencia Department, located in the east of the province. It occupies a strip of land west of the confluence of the Limay and Neuquén rivers which form t ...

, the capital city of the province, is located in this department. The department is named ''Confluencia'' after the

confluence In geography, a confluence (also ''conflux'') occurs where two or more watercourses join to form a single channel (geography), channel. A confluence can occur in several configurations: at the point where a tributary joins a larger river (main ...

of the rivers

and Limay.

Geography

The department borders on the north with

Añelo Department Añelo is a department located in the east of Neuquén Province, Argentina. Geography The Department is bounded by Pehuenches Department in the north, Rio Negro Province to the east, Confluencia Department on the southeast, Zapala Department to ...

, on the east and southeast with Rio Negro Province, on the southwest with Picún Leufú Department and with Zapala Department on the west.

Economy

Agriculture

Agriculture is one of the most important activities in the area. The major productions in the zone are

apple An apple is a round, edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus'' spp.). Fruit trees of the orchard or domestic apple (''Malus domestica''), the most widely grown in the genus, are agriculture, cultivated worldwide. The tree originated ...

peach The peach (''Prunus persica'') is a deciduous tree first domesticated and Agriculture, cultivated in China. It bears edible juicy fruits with various characteristics, most called peaches and the glossy-skinned, non-fuzzy varieties called necta ...

es and

pear Pears are fruits produced and consumed around the world, growing on a tree and harvested in late summer into mid-autumn. The pear tree and shrub are a species of genus ''Pyrus'' , in the Family (biology), family Rosaceae, bearing the Pome, po ...

Power sources

Electricity

In Confluencia Department there are many important power sources. In Villa El Chocón is located El Chocón Dam, one of the most important electricity sources of the country, with Yacyretá Dam located in

Misiones Province Misiones (, ''Missions'') is one of the Provinces of Argentina, 23 provinces of Argentina, located in the northeastern corner of the country in the Mesopotamia, Argentina, Mesopotamia region. It is surrounded by Paraguay to the northwest, Brazil ...

. The power generated by the dam is 222 MVA for each generator, and 180 MVA for each transformer. A new kind of production of energy used in the province, as in the department, is

wind power Wind power is the use of wind energy to generate useful work. Historically, wind power was used by sails, windmills and windpumps, but today it is mostly used to generate electricity. This article deals only with wind power for electricity ge ...

but on a small scale.

Petroleum

In the Confluencia Department area, petroleum is extracted mostly in the El Chocón area.

Culture

In the department there are important museums located in the capital city,

, and an important paleontologic museum located in Villa el Chocón managed by Ruben Carolini, who discovered one of the most important pieces in exhibition at the museum, the '' Giganotosaurus carolinii'' in 1995. {{coord, 38, 57, 05, S, 68, 03, 33, W, source:kolossus-eswiki, display=title Departments of Neuquén Province