Located on the Guadalquivir river and inaugurated on November 30, 1916 by King Alfonso XIII, the project was the work of the architect Antonio Palacios Ramilo and built by the Mengemor company.

The Mengíbar Dam was an important civil work in its time, as it was one of the first hydraulic power plants to be built in Spain with mobile gates. Until then, the dams were fixed and, if they exceeded their capacity, they overflowed. However, in the case of Mengíbar, in anticipation of possible floods, Mengemor engineers devised to install mobile gates that allow the water to be discharged into the river in a controlled manner.