THE KHONE PHAPHENG WATERFALL SIPANGDON SOUTHERN LAO
cred Tom Fawthrop
Explorers, travelers and traders have long been enchanted by
the magical vistas and extraordinary biodiversity of the Mekong flowing through
six countries, from the mountains of Tibet to the delta in Vietnam.
However the voracious demands of an energy-hungry region
have led to a headlong rush into hydropower and a simmering conflict over the
vitally important water resources of this great international river.
The current plans for a cascade of 11 dams on the main
stream of the Lower Mekong is a recipe for killing the turbulent spirit of the
mighty Mekong, taming its waters and the wonders of nature in the obsessive
pursuit of energy at all costs.
The supporters of large dams argue hydropower is an
allegedly ‘clean efficient source for of energy.’ They further claim that dams
stimulate economic growth and promote development.
However the opposition to all dam projects on the mainstream
Mekong, starts with the rural communities along the Mekong and its river basin
supporting a 60 million population. The dam developers and government
technocrats have failed to examine and study the hidden costs of hydropower,
and the irreversible destruction of a unique ecosystem.
A wide-spectrum of critics points to well-documented list of
negative impacts: the reduction of water flow and sediment, the huge loss of fisheries,
the reduction of food security, and the increasing salinization-intrusion of
sea water in the delta, to name but a few serious impacts which run counter to
any narrative that dams automatically bring economic progress and
“development.”
2016 will be a decisive year for hydropower projects on the
mainstream Mekong. The first dam on the Lower Mekong –the Xayaburi Dam is now
60% built. The Don Sahong dam in southern Lao has just been launched, in
January this year and a third dam the Pak Beng is being prepared.
Can hydropower on a mainstream river be sustainable?
The unilateral launch of the Xayaburi dam in 2012 and now the Don Sahong dam –
second dam on the mainstream of the Mekong, is turning the river away from the
historical vision of an international river of cooperation and friendship
between Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam, and into another conflict zone
over the sharing of water resources.
However the government of Laos is not under any pressure
from any of the bodies that ought to be grievously concerned: UN agencies like
UNEP and FAO .The World Bank, WLE (Water, Land and Ecosystems, a CGIAR consultancy
group); the USAID-sponsored Mekong Partnership for the Environment (MPE); nor
other bodies that adhere to the mantra of ‘sustainable hydropower’ and
environmental protection.
This term identifies a discourse that argues a
well-mitigated ‘nice dam’ does not inflict too much damage on the ecosystem. It
is a position that offers great comfort and solace to dam developers, investors
and banks under fire from environmentalists and scientists.
Within this cluster of concern about water governance and
claims to protect the environment of the 4,880 kilometres long Mekong, there is
a grand silence by the donor nations and international bodies that greets the
decline of the region’s longest river and the launch of yet another dam.
A regional coordinator for the WLE program has argued the
case for ‘sustainable hydropower’ and trade-offs.
“We all enjoy the benefits that come with electric lighting,
household appliances”, says Kim Geheb, WLE. “But how do we do this without
affecting food production and the health of the environment? How do we ensure
that rapid, large-scale dam development is fair and equitable? Answers to these
questions are at the heart of what constitutes a ‘good’ dam.”
Xayaburi dam construction site.
Photo: Stimson Center
The two dams launched so far on the Lower Mekong in Laos
surely do not appear to fulfill any obvious criteria for the sustainability
principle of what constitutes a ‘good dam. ‘The Xayaburi and the Don Sahong
dams along the Mekong are neither fair nor equitable, for the overwhelming
majority of poor farming communities living downstream from these dams. These
two dams both lack credible environmental impact assessments (EIAs), have
failed to provide any trans-boundary studies, and have been launched in
defiance of wide-ranging protest and riparian objections.
Scientific consultants to WWF (The World –Wide Fund for
Nature) have issued a number of reports exposing massive flaws in
these two projects and the lack of credibility of their assurances of effective
fish mitigation.
Latest data published by Catch and Culture MRC’s
fisheries publication shows that threat posed to the Mekong is based on hidden
economic costs that will occur the Mekong is dammed.
The Mekong is a very special river hosting the world’s
largest inland fisheries valued at $11 billion ($11 billion for wild capture
but that total figure is $17 billion if fish farms along the Mekong are
included.) It ranks with the Amazon for the extraordinary diversity of fish
species at around 1000 and scientists are still counting.
PAKSE FISH MARKET – A TYPICAL RAINY SEASON CATCH FROM
SIPANGDON (4 THOUSAND ISLANDS). THIS GREAT SOURCE OF FOOD SECURITY IN SOUTHERN
LAOS COULD SOON BE CUT BACK BY THE DISRUPTION OF FISH MIGRATION BY THE
CONSTRUCTION OF THE DAM THAT WILL BLOCK THE MAIN FISH ROUTE FROM DOWNSTREAM
CAMBODIA TO LAO
(credit Tom Fawthrop)
Estimated fisheries contributed $2.8 billion to Cambodia’s
economy in 2015. That’s a big chunk of Cambodia’s $16.71 billion GDP. These
catches for wild-capture fisheries are directly under threat from
hydro-electric dams.
Studies have shown that the projected loss of fisheries,
crops and biodiversity caused by dams will result in a staggeringly high
deficit, compared to the modest benefits from increased energy and electricity.
The 2015 study calculates the
Mekong net loss at
minus $2.4 billion (for 6 dams) and up to minus $21.8 billion if all eleven
dams are built on the mainstream according to a study published by Chiang
Rai University
The science shows that it does not even make good economic
sense to build more large dams, in a river blessed by such amazing ecological
wealth.
The mitigation game fools no one
Sustainable hydropower and its concern to minimize harm to
the environment relies heavily on mitigation technology, including such devices
as fish passage, fish ladders and even so-called ‘fish-friendly’ turbines.
Christy Owen, party leader of the MPE (The US-Aid backed
Mekong Partnership for Environment) explained at a recent forum: “This
work can help ensure that new development projects meet the needs of business,
while minimizing harm to local communities and the environment.”
Her statement assumes that no matter the high stakes, and
the calamitous effects of ‘bad dams’, dams are somehow “destined to go ahead”
after a measure of mitigation and refinement
Fish mitigation technology has mostly been applied and
tested in northern climes – the rivers of North America, and parts of northern
Europe. Importing this technology to the Mekong and other tropical rivers
teeming with a vastly greater variety of fish species than in the rivers of
colder countries, is seen by most fisheries experts as highly risky at best.
THE XAYABURI DAM CONSTRUCTION 2015– THE FIRST HYDROPOWER
PROJECT TO BE BUILT ON THE LOWER MEKONG. PRESSURE FROM CRITICS OF THE DAM –
NGOS SCIENTISTS AND THE GOVERNMENTS OF CAMBODIA & VIETNAM- THE THAI
DEVELOPER AND THEIR ZURICH-BASED CONSULTANTS ADOPTED FISH MITIGATION TECHNOLOGY
BASED ON EXPERIENCE IN NORTHERN EUROPE AND SWTZRLAND. (pic International Rivers)
What may work in the rivers of North America, Norway and
Switzerland cannot be mechanically transferred to the vastly more diverse fish
species and ecology of the Amazon and the Mekong.
Hydropower consultant working with WWF Dr. Jian-Hua Meng
views the mitigation carried out by Swiss consultants on the Xayaburi dam as a
huge gamble with the river’s natural resources. “They are playing roulette
with the livelihoods of over 60 million people. It would not be acceptable in
Europe, so why is it different in Asia?” [1]
The mitigation team employed by Mega-First, the Malaysian
developer of the Don Sahong dam, has been engineering fish diversion channels
so that fish will change their centuries- old route along the Sahong channel
which will be totally blocked by the building of the Don Sahong Dam.
NGO mobilization in Thailand against
the Don Sahong Dam.
However the MRC panel of experts found no evidence that this
engineering project would guarantee the protection of large quantities of
migratory fish of many different species by offering an untested alternative
migration route to bypass the traditional channel according to MRC fisheries
expert Dr So Nam (Pakse MRC technical review of experts December 2014).
Mekong specialist Dr. Philip Hirsch, based at University of
Sydney shared with this correspondent “After 30 years of studying dam
impacts, I have yet to come across one [dam], whose impacts have been
well-mitigated. Let’s start with dams that are already there, before using
‘anticipated mitigation’ as a pretext for going ahead with new projects.”
The evidence is clear: there is nothing sustainable about large
dams
A widely cited Oxford University study, published in the journal Energy
Policy in
March 2014, reviewed data from 245 large dams in 65 different countries,
and concluded that large dams in
general are not sustainable.
As the authors wrote in a statement attached to the
study: “The evidence is conclusive: Large dams in a vast majority of cases
are not economically viable. Instead of obtaining hoped-for riches, emerging
economies risk drowning their fragile economies in debt, owing to ill-advised
construction of large dams.”
The global governance debate has clearly shifted business
towards paying more attention to environmental protection issues, but all too
often this is more a concern to improve their corporate image and improving
their public relations, rather than a genuine will rethink their on-going
strategy for damming the Mekong.
From his decades of research in the Mekong region Dr Philip
Hirsch concludes: “The impacts of some dams are just too great to
mitigate.”
WWF warns that hydropower does not mitigate of climate
change. But with the Mekong under threat from an annual decline in water flow
from the melting glaciers in Tibet, it can on the contrary exacerbate and drive
climate change.
The evidence is steadily mounting that if we allow the
Mekong to be comprehensively dammed, climate change will grow worse with
increasing droughts and salinization from the ocean. The region will then be
saddled with a ruined Mekong and the riparian peoples will be damned into
around 20 years time to the tragic and irreversible legacy of unsustainable
hydropower.
The only way to save the Mekong is by pushing for regional
countries and the wider world to understand the ecological wealth and the real
economic value of great rivers like the Amazon and the Mekong.
References:
www.mrcmekong.org › … › Initiative on Sustainable Hydropower
The SEA presents trans-boundary impacts of the proposed
mainstream … As with any commissioned study, the SEA report is not an
official MRC approved document.
www.nationmultimedia.com › national
Oct 16, 2014 – … River yesterday lodged a petition with
the Administrative Court in Bangkok, … Court on June 24 to accept the
network’s right to bring a lawsuit
www.mrcmekong.org › News & Events › Newsletters
Jan 5, 2016 – Lower Mekong
fisheries estimated to be worth around $17 billion a year
… Catch and Culture is published three times a year by the
office of the Mekong River … are available through the MRC website,www.mrcmekong.org
The 2015 study calculates the
Mekong net loss at
minus $2.4 billion ( for 6 dams) and up to -21.8 $billion ( for 11 dams)
Volume 69, June 2014, Pages 43–56
Oxford Univesity study on the impacts of large dams .The study is based on data
from 245 large dams in 65 different countries.
Should we build more large dams? The actual costs of
hydropower megaproject development
Latest research pubished in 2015 by Chiang Rai University
Mekong research group http://www.mfu.ac.th/nremc/content_detail.php?id=298
Contact the author:
Tom Fawthrop
director of THE GREAT GAMBLE ON THE MEKONG
EUREKA FILMS 2015
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