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Post Info TOPIC: Laos garantee New Dams Won't Harm Environment !!!
samakomlao


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Laos garantee New Dams Won't Harm Environment !!!
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Photo: hydro power, laos style, luang namtha river 

BANGKOK, Thailand -

Laos insisted Friday that its plans to build as many as nine new dams and expand its hydroelectric capacity 10-fold in the next eight years will not harm the environment.


The new dams will generate 7,000 megawatts of electricity, of which 5,000 megawatts will be sold to Thailand, with the rest going to Vietnam and Cambodia, Laotian Energy and Mines Minister Bosaykham Vongdara said at a hydro forum.


Laos is negotiating to supply Thailand with an additional 2,000 megawatts after 2015, Bosaykham said.


Landlocked Laos currently has 700 megawatts of hydroelectric generating capacity.


A majority of the new dams - including the World Bank-financed Nam Theun 2 project - will be built on tributaries of the Mekong River.


Viraphonh Viravong, the ministry's director general, said Laos will aim to strike a balance between providing electricity for parts of Southeast Asia and ensuring the projects follow strict environmental standards.


"They have to be developed according to the guidelines of the World Bank and the rules of the environment," Viraphonh said, boasting that Laos has the potential of generating as much as 20,000 megawatts of electricity from hydropower.


"If we have too much problems, a project will not fly," he said. "The first thing is the environment and then we can go to the economics and finance. All parties have to benefit from a project."


Ian Porter, the World Bank's Southeast Asia regional director, said expanding hydropower from Laos can help the impoverished country reach middle class status by 2020 while ensuring Thailand maintains its steady economic growth.

However, environmental groups such as International Rivers Network remain unconvinced that the hydropower boom will benefit Laos. They say the dam projects will destroy biologically rich river networks and displace scores of villages.


"The status quo indicates that the Lao hydro boom will be a major bust for hundreds of thousands of Lao farmers and fishers," Shannon Lawrence, Laos program director for International Rivers Network, said in a statement. "Thai dam builders, funders and electricity consumers should not support Lao projects that do not meet the highest environmental and social standards."

Thai Energy Minister Piyasvasti Amranand scoffed at the opposition to the dams, suggesting that environmentalists should "go and live in Laos for a week" to experience the impoverished conditions that villagers must endure.

"How could you raise the standard of living of the people of Laos to the standard you see in an industrialized country?" Piyasvasti asked.


"I think it would only be fair to achieve that goal of raising incomes of the Thai people and the Lao people to the standards you enjoy in the West," he said. "I can't see how you can do that without building hydroelectric dams."

Source: www.forbes.com



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paris_vientiane


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very happy to read something like that :)

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paris_vientiane


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another interesting article:
"BY Invitation

Sustainable hydropower can benefit us all
IANC. PORTER

The words ''sustainable hydropower'' reflect the growing recognition around the world that hydro projects need to benefit everyone involved: from the local villagers to the government; from the private or public investor to the energy consumer; from the country to the global community.

In Laos, the joint work between government, developers, donors, civil society and local communities is making it possible to develop financially sound hydro projects that are socially and environmentally responsible and will improve the living standards of its people.

Thailand, in turn, as the main buyer of energy from the Lao market, is showing its commitment to ensuring that the energy it is buying is socially and environmentally ''clean''; that it is not supplying its thriving market with energy while damaging the environmental resources of its neighbour, but on the contrary, that it is helping its neighbour make the best use of its resources.

If we take a step back to look around the world, we can find examples that show that sustainable hydro can indeed benefit all stakeholders involved.

Hydropower, for example, can be one of the most efficient and cost-effective ways to generate renewable energy; it does not produce the same harmful emissions as fossil fuels, such as natural gas, oil, or coal. It can also reduce the impact of catastrophic events, such as floods and drought. In this way, hydro shows it can be globally beneficial.

If soundly implemented, hydropower projects can also improve environmental management while mitigating impacts, and can help improve the living standards of the local people. Hydro can thus benefit local communities.

Moreover sustainable hydropower can provide enduring economic benefits through sustained revenue flows that can allow countries such as Laos to reduce poverty and ensure benefits to all its citizens. Hydro can have country-wide benefits.

However, poorly planned hydropower development can pose significant environmental and social challenges. It can have adverse impacts on the aquatic ecosystems, involve displacement of a considerable number of people and alter the ecological landscape of an area.

To avoid this, great efforts must be made to minimise the social and environmental impacts and to ensure that the economic benefits of hydropower projects will be shared equally. All stakeholders can, and should, benefit from hydro. But challenges need to be properly addressed if they are to be overcome and that is also, everyone's responsibility.

In this context, perhaps the most current example in the region of sustainable hydropower is the Nam Theun 2 project being developed in Laos. It is a project where all involved are watching hard to ensure that resettled villagers will experience improved living standards; that the country will have needed revenue to invest in poverty programmes; that an ecologically rich watershed will be protected; that investors will obtain forecasted profits; and that part of the Thai energy demand will be economically met, among other things.

This project is a continuation of the partnership between Thailand and Laos in the development of hydropower that has nearly two decades of history, and that is being strengthened with the first Lao-Thai High Level Forum on Sustainable Hydropower Development taking place in Bangkok today.

Lao and Thai authorities, private developers, donor organisations, civil society and media have come together to share lessons on past hydro developments and discuss how to ensure future projects are environmentally and socially sound as well as financially viable.

All sides have lessons to share and things to learn from each other. But more importantly perhaps, all sides have a responsibility to ensure that Lao develops its resources in a way that is beneficial to its environment and to the Lao people, while at the same time beneficial to the Thai population and investors, as well as the global community.

It is time to look beyond one-off benefits, or to think of benefits as only for some and not for others. We can and should aim for benefits for all involved. This first high-level forum taking place today is a major step in this direction. It will, of course, now be up to all of us to ensure that sustainable hydro does benefit us all.

Ian C. Porter is the country director for Southeast Asia for the World Bank.
"

http://www.bangkokpost.com/070907_Business/07Sep2007_biz44.php

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Anonymous

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Yes, it's very clear and, probably, nothing needs to be added.

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