Nam Ou and Hydro Power projects

Lone Rider

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Was last week travelling from LPB to Pak Beng and took the long way via Pak Mong and Oudomxay. Noticed a new access road to the Nam Ou 2 hydropower project and found today an article in LaoVoices about this project (copied below). Most probably construction will start early next year which in its turn probably will imply that boats no longer can travel from Nongkhiao to Luang Prabang something which is now quite popular for tourists returning to Luang Prabang from Nongkhiao.

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Public consultation underway on Nam Ou dam

Posted by LV on Monday, November 14, 2011

Construction of the Nam Ou 2 dam in Luang Prabang province could begin next year following reviews of the environmental and social impact assessments.

A national consultation workshop on the environmental and social impact assessments of the dam was held in Vientiane last week, attended by government representatives, provincial authorities and members of the public whose lives are likely to be impacted by the project. The dam is planned at a location 53km from the mouth of the Nam Ou river, spanning the two districts of Ngoy and Nambak and measuring 49m in height and 300m in length. The proposed plant would have a capacity of 120MW and would be able to produce 546 KWh of electricity per year. The site will span 16 square km with construction costs estimated at US$15.6 million, according to a government report.

The project is expected to benefit people in the northern provinces by supplying electricity to households and for further development.
The government has agreed to sign a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Sinohydro Corporation to study the possibility of seven dams on the Nam Ou river. The project has commissioned Earth Systems Lao to carry out a feasibility study and make environmental and social impact assessments.
At present, Sinohydro Corporation plans to build only three dams, the Nam Ou 2 in Luang Prabang province and the Nam Ou 5 and 6 in Phongsaly province, Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Mr Sisavath Vithaxay told the workshop.

The government has signed an MOU to supply 7,000MW of electricity to Thailand after 2015 and 5,000MW to Vietnam by 2020, he said. To reach these targets, Laos needs 30 small, medium and large hydropower plants, he added. The government has also signed an agreement to sell 20MW of electricity to Stung Treng province in Cambodia. The government has promised it will use the income earned from the sale of electricity to develop the economy and alleviate poverty. The first benefits for Lao people will be improvements in health, education, social services, transport, and water and electricity supply.

“As we are aware, the energy sector, particularly hydropower, has contributed to socio-economic deve-lopment and through this workshop I hope we can overcome any environmental and social problems so that the project can go ahead and run smoothly,” Mr Sisavath said.

Source: Vientiane Times
By Khamphone Syvongxay
(Latest Update November 14, 2011)
 
Good article on this controversial dam below. Implication in middle of article that certain elites can be bought off hence silence--sounds very plausible.

Also the numbers for the Xayaburi project from the press release above seem wrong (but I stand corrected as they will build 30 (!) dams): the 850m long Xayaburu dam will supply 1260 MW of power. To put this in perspective, the average person in the west consumes about 1kW power so this would service 1.26M people in the west--not that many people. In developing countries they use a lot less power per person, so let's say 4x as little, so this dam could service about 5M people. So an entire ecosystem will be destroyed so 5M people can have a bit more electricity. Shame, and the West should step in and just buy the power generation and build them a power plant in return for keeping the river pristine--but that's a tall order.

So the small dam mentioned, which will wipe out many fish, is 120MW or enough power for 120k Westerners and maybe 500k Laotians. For a small town of 120k to 500k an entire river is destroyed.

The only saving grace: except for endangered species (which will go extinct), dams do kill off fish but once the dam is removed, by blowing it up, the fish often come back. Hopefully when this dam silts up in about 50 years (since lots of sentiment in these young rivers it won't take that long for these dams to become useless) there'll be enough fish not extinct to repopulate the river. And BTW fish ladders don't work that well, that's why dams are harmful. Of course the USA has done the same damn thing, pun intended, placing too many dams along certain rivers.


http://www.economist.com/node/21538158

One dam thing after another
Though the Mekong is in peril, riparian governments seem oddly insouciant
Nov 12th 2011 | from the print edition
 
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