 The Challenge Program on Water and Food- (CPWF) Mekong dams database provides the locations of every known commissioned, under-construction and planned dam in the Construction of a giant controversial dam in Opponents of these projects said their commencement would also kick off the construction of the 9 other dams planned by Regional leaders have continued to beat the drum of safeguarding the mighty river, but in reality, the rhetoric has been more prominent than action, environmental activists say. They say that although it is still not too late to put a brake on the damming frenzy and devise a plan to promote the sustainable development of the But apparently, “powerful commercial interests have been allowed to ransack the In November 2012, A technical review released in March 2011 by the Mekong River Commission (MRC) - a regional body established to coordinate dam projects on the river - on the Xayaburi dam is considered the most comprehensive analysis of its potential impact. It warns that more than 50 studies are still required before regional governments reach a consensus over whether the Xayaburi and other But last September, A regional summit that ended recently in “While [we are] pleased that Mekong leaders recognize the negative environmental and social impacts that hydropower development poses to the mainstream, we are disappointed that leaders did not condemn the current rush of dam building on the Mekong mainstream,” Ame Trandem, Southeast Asia program director for International Rivers, said in a statement issued after the Mekong River Commission summit wrapped up April 5 in Ho Chi Minh City. “Words without actions are meaningless,” Trandem said. “The Lao government must stop its free reign of Business as usual Viraphonh Viravong, Landlocked “The Lao government sees hydropower as something of a silver bullet to lift the country out of poverty and genuinely believes there is no alternative,” Philip Hirsch, director of the Australian Mekong Resource Center at the University of Sydney, told Thanh Nien News. But given that the power to be produced by the 260-megawatt Don Sahong dam is quite small, experts say an important question, in this context, is which are the more and less damaging sites for dam construction. “Building a dam that blocks the major fish migration route in the model of one of the world's most significant artisanal freshwater fisheries does not seem like a very sensible priority,” Hirsch said. Environmental groups warn that the impacts posed by the Don Sahong dam bring a new level of risk to the biodiversity of the Viraphonh shrugged off such concerns. “We are very confident that there will be no significant impact on the downstream of the river,” Viraphonh said, adding that But those in the opposing camp do not buy into this assurance. They say these claims are based on models which have never been tested in the “The stakes are high and continuing to build ‘Right to develop’ While Viraphonh, the Lao energy official, bristled at criticism that his country has provided no information to its neighbors about how it plans to address the serious impacts that experts expect to see on important migratory fishes species, saying He maintained that for a small project like Don Sahong, only notification would be needed. But, more importantly, he stressed that “  A Cambodian fisherman who lives by the Muddy the Addressing an Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting in "It would not be over-exaggerating... to view the water resources of the 21st century as the oil of the 19th and 20th centuries," Sang said. Environmental activists say Laos’s “unilateral” move to plow ahead with the construction of two controversial dams highlights the urgency to give the 1995 Mekong Agreement more teeth. “Because the [treaty] and its procedures are riddled with ambiguities, the Meanwhile, experts have lamented that International Rivers, a US-based nonprofit group that works to protect rivers, has been collecting information on In Southeast Asia alone, it said, the number of Chinese dams that are under construction or are proposed include 10 in Cambodia, 26 in Laos, and 55 in Myanmar. Of them, four are to be built on the mainstream Mekong - three in In the meantime, Given the scale and size of these dams, experts say there are certainly other environmental impacts like withholding sediment and changed flow volumes and quantity on the lower They also say there are well-grounded fears that “China itself doesn't need the power but stands to gain in two ways: First, work for Chinese dam-building and engineering companies,” said Richard Cronin, director of the Southeast Asia program at Stimson Center, a US-based research institute. “Second, |
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