Editorial: Dam of distress

The new $137-billion dam project could risk geological disasters and impact the flow of water from China to India

China’s approval to build the world’s largest hydropower project on the Yarlung Tsangpo River in Tibet is fraught with far-reaching environmental and geopolitical implications, particularly for India. The fact that India has not been informed about the controversial project, despite being the lower riparian State, exposes Beijing’s dubious intentions. The new $137-billion project — estimated to produce 300 billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity annually — would dwarf the Three Gorges Dam, currently the largest in the world. Such massive dams could risk geological disasters, including earthquakes and impact the flow of water from China to India. The bulk of the water in the Brahmaputra system comes from Tibet. Moreover, this region is among the world’s most ecologically fragile and earthquake-prone. As a lower riparian State with established user rights to the waters of the river, India has consistently voiced its concerns to the Chinese side over mega projects upstream. The proposed dam would displace local communities, significantly alter the natural landscape and damage local ecosystems, which are among the richest and most diverse on the Tibetan Plateau. Reports from China indicate that the colossal development would require at least four 20km-long tunnels to be drilled through the Namcha Barwa mountain, diverting the flow of the Yarlung Tsangpo, Tibet’s longest river. Experts have also flagged concerns that the dam would empower China to control or divert the flow of the trans-border river, which flows south into India’s Arunachal Pradesh and Assam and onwards into Bangladesh.

China has constructed multiple hydropower stations along the course of the Yarlung Tsangpo over the past decade in a bid to harness the river’s power as a source of renewable energy. The proposed mega dam is likely to be at a site in the Big Bend area of the Yarlung Tsangpo, where the river takes a U-turn and enters India just over 20 km downstream. The adverse consequences of the project for India will manifest in many ways. It will disrupt water flows in the Siang, as the river is called after entering India and is the main channel of the Brahmaputra River system. It will significantly impact the river flows and consequently, the livelihoods of residents downstream. While India has been a responsible upper riparian State — providing generous terms to Pakistan under the Indus Waters Treaty despite troubled bilateral relations — China has a poor track record of honouring the agreements. Unlike the existing run-of-the-river projects in Tibet, the new project involves diversion and huge storage of water. While it is too early to say if the colossal dam project would turn into a new bilateral flashpoint, the Indian side must seek clarifications on the technical parameters of the project and environmental impact studies. China should be asked to respect the core principles of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses.

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