A hydropower dam on Srepok River in
the dry season. Photo: ND Tu
When asked about his success as a soldier and politician, U.S. President
Eisenhower said: “Whenever I run into a problem I can’t solve, I always make it
bigger. I can never solve it by trying to make it smaller, but if I make
it big enough, I can begin to see the outlines of a solution.”
Eisenhower’s approach to
problem-solving made him a successful leader. And it may be relevant to
the situation in the Mekong today.
While they are neighbors, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam vary greatly in size,
population, natural resource abundance, and level of economic
development.
Their interests do not necessarily
converge. In fact, when it comes to the Mekong, they’ve clearly
diverged.
Having dammed the headwaters of the
Sesan and Srepok Rivers, Vietnam is now primarily concerned about water and
sediment delivery to the economically vital Mekong Delta.
Without sufficient sediment to
replenish the land, the delta will sink beneath the East Sea--a problem
compounded by unsustainable groundwater pumping and rising sea level.
Laos considers the Mekong primarily as a resource to be harnessed for
hydropower, mostly for export to Thailand, to generate revenue to drive
national development.
This has resulted in a boom in dam
building over the past 15 years including three dams on the Mekong
mainstream.
Cambodia, home to the Tonle Sap, the world’s largest freshwater fishery, is
more circumspect about hydropower because of its impact on fish production in a
country whose population depends on freshwater fish for 75% of its animal
protein.
But given low levels of
electrification and near-total dependence on expensive imports for its
electricity supply, there is a pressing need to develop domestic sources of
power.
Hydropower is currently the favored
option, despite food security concerns.
In late 2017, the 400 MW Lower Sesan
2 (LS2), was complete, closing the Srepok and Sesan to the free passage of
migratory fish and trapping almost all the upstream sediment.
These divergent interests have brought the three countries into increasingly
open disagreement.
Vietnam sees the survival of the
Mekong Delta, responsible for 50% of its rice and 75% of its high-value fruit
and aquaculture production, as a matter of national security.
Laos, which has few foreign exchange
generating alternatives, is determined to build more dams.
In pursuit of energy security,
Cambodia is considering building two huge dams, the Stung Treng and Sambor, on
the Mekong mainstream.
Whether or not these dams make economic sense is increasingly open to question
given the dramatic decline in the price of solar and wind power, which have
contributed to Thailand’s decision to suspend the power purchase agreement for
the Pak Beng dam in Laos.
As an indication of how fast
technology evolves, under a 10-year old contract, the Cambodian government is
obliged to buy power from the Chinese-owned LS2 at ¢7/KWhr, a similar price as
solar today but at much higher environmental cost (LS2 is projected to
singlehandedly reduce basin-wide fish production by almost 10%).
We seem to have reached a stalemate. Vietnam has adopted a victim mentality,
protesting against dams but without presenting any alternatives.
In Laos, hydropower is almost
entirely dictated by foreign, mostly Thai and Chinese, firms and receives very
little revenue from dams built under 30-year build-own-operate-transfer
contracts.
Cambodia is keeping its options
open. Instead of bringing these countries together, the discordant
development of the Mekong is pushing them apart.
An exclusive focus on water does indeed limit the scope for cooperation because
there are no solutions that currently satisfy all three countries.
However, it is also the case that
Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam can each offer its neighbors something that they
cannot achieve by themselves.
Laos and Cambodia can address
Vietnam’s concerns by prioritizing dams that minimize downstream impacts and by
expanding the use of non-hydro renewables. And Vietnam has much to offer
its neighbors.
Vietnam can invest in a national grid in Laos that allows Laos to charge
transmission fees, thereby both reducing its dependence on hydropower, and
providing an immediate income stream.
A national grid in Laos would also
accelerate the buildout of solar and wind farms and permit regional power
trading.
Together, these would let the three
countries meet projected demand at a lower cost and with far fewer
dams.
Similarly, Vietnam can help Cambodia
speed up rural electrification and generate foreign exchange by building
large-scale solar plants in Cambodia where land is much cheaper. This
would reduce the need for mainstream dams.
Vietnam can strengthen cooperation on other natural resource
sectors.
Cambodia and Laos are struggling to
suppress illegal logging in the face of rising demand from Vietnam for timber
to feed its wooden furniture business, which exported more than $8 billion in
2017.
Similarly, the proposed nomination
of Him Nam No as Laos’ first natural World Heritage Site is threatened by the
illegal wildlife and timber trade in which Vietnam plays a major role as
hunter, consumer, and trafficker.
Simply put, Cambodia and Laos cannot
enforce their own forestry and wildlife laws without Vietnam’s active
cooperation.
So per Eisenhower’s dictum of expanding a problem to solve it, expanding
regional coordination beyond water to include energy and natural resource
sectors could open the door to new opportunities for regional cooperation on
the basis of reciprocity and synergies.
This approach would shift the
discussion from zero-sum--my gain results in your loss--to mutual benefits
across multiple sectors.
One could imagine Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam negotiating a “grand bargain”
covering water, energy, timber, and wildlife that helps each country achieve
key development objectives at much lower environment, social, and political
risks.
As their economies grow and become
increasingly inter-dependent, the mutual advantages of such an agreement will
grow.
And as the country with the most
advanced economy and is most vulnerable to the impacts of upstream hydropower,
Vietnam has the capacity and self-interest to lead the negotiation process.
Jake Brunner/Brian Eyler
SOURCE:
http://m.english.vietnamnet.vn/fms/environment/198331/mekong-transboundary-cooperation--making-a-problem-bigger.html
