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On November 28, 2003, 300 grassroots activists, people affected by large dams and representatives of non-governmental organizations gathered in a small village in Rasi Salai district, in Northeastern Thailand. They met for a five-day conference on large dams under the rallying cry of "Rivers for Life".
Since the late 1980s, the networks of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and other civil society groups have become an influential voice in international politics and economics. As many dam builders have become painfully aware, dam fighters and critics have formed one of the most effective international civil society networks. Unlike others, their network does not primarily consist of professional NGOs, but includes strong grassroots movements of people directly affected by large dams.
The “Rivers for Life” conference was organized by a coalition of groups around International Rivers Network and the Southeast Asian Rivers Network. Its purpose was for the participants to exchange experiences, evaluate progress, and devise new strategies to protect rivers and fight socially and environmentally destructive dam projects.
The program included educational sessions on the state of the dam industry, presentations on anti-dam struggles and social movements in the different regions of the world, and 30 workshops on topics such as the role of financial institutions in promoting dams, the value of balanced options assessments in pressing for sustainable water and energy development projects, the legal means to seek redress for past damages, and efforts to decommission large dams. Field trips took the visitors to the Pak Mun and Rasi Salai dams, two hydropower projects on the Mun river that have been the focus of intense struggles for more than a decade. Cultural events, exhibits from around the world, informal chats and a wild party allowed the participants to relax and strengthen their personal bonds.
High spirits…
The local hosts of “Rivers for Life” had built a small village for the conference with meeting halls and dormitories all made from bamboo and other local materials. The “Rivers for Life” village was built on a floodplain that had been submerged by the Rasi Salai dam in the early 1990s. After a long fight by the local communities, the gates of the dam were opened. The fish that form the basis of the local economy are slowly returning, although their migration is still hampered by the downstream Pak Mun dam.
“With unity and insistence, successes like in Rasi Salai can be achieved all over the world”, Phraijit Silarak of Thailand’s Assembly of the Poor said as he welcomed the participants of the conference. The location on lands that had been retrieved from a reservoir was indeed symbolic for the high spirits of the “Rivers for Life” participants. They noted that internationally, public awareness about the social, environmental and economic costs of large dams was increasing, the World Commission on Dams had vindicated many of their criticisms and demands, and the rate of dam building had dropped sharply since the 1970s.
In 1997, dam-affected people and their allies had convened for a first international meeting in Curitiba, Brazil. The growth in numbers, the expertise and skills of the “Rivers for Life” participants documented the growing strength of their international network. “People learn by organizing themselves”, Jose Josivaldo de Oliveira, a dam-affected farmer from Brazil’s Northeast and a leader of the country’s Movement of Dam-Affected People, said at the opening ceremony in Rasi Salai. “Step by step, we have taken this process of self-organization from the local to the national and international level.”
… and new challenges
In spite of growing successes, the dam fighters and critics who met in Rasi Salai were aware of the new challenges they faced. The World Bank plans to return to the dam-building era through its new, high-risk water sector strategy. Governments and financial institutions are shifting from developing individual projects to devising grand regional dam-building schemes such as the Mekong power grid program, India’s river linking scheme, and the hydropower plan of the New Economic Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD). While dam critics believe that the answer to climate change lies in reducing wasteful consumption in the North, the dam industry hopes that global warming will provide a new justification for building dams. And while the World Bank and other institutions of the dam lobby make their case for building new dams, the vast majority of the rural poor remain excluded from water and power development strategies that increasingly focus on the needs of urban middle classes. “The global large dam era has been marked by a sharply growing and unacceptable inequality between South and North, and between rich and poor”, a declaration that the participants endorsed at the end of their conference proclaims.
Responding to the recent trends in dam building, NGOs and social movements have begun to create stronger regional networks, in order to address the emerging challenges of regional dam-building schemes. The participants of “Rivers for Life” committed to closely monitoring the plans of the World Bank and other actors of the dam industry. Many groups expressed a strong interest in identifying legal means to address the outstanding problems of existing dams. They were equally interested in learning more about international experiences with decommissioning dams.
Maybe most importantly, the conference participants were aware of their need to become more active in promoting positive, community-based options of bringing water and power to the poor, thereby avoiding the destructive impacts of large dams. The workshops in which groups from around the world presented their experiences with community-based water management were well-attended and became a highlight of the conference. In their Rasi Salai declaration, the participants committed to both “intensifying [their] struggles and campaigns against destructive dams and for reparations and river and watershed restoration”, and to “working to implement worldwide sustainable and appropriate methods of water and energy management such as rainwater harvesting and community-managed renewable energy schemes”. The motto of the conference, “Rivers for Life!”, expresses the self-confident, forward-looking spirit of the international movement that met in Rasi Salai.
The Rasi Salai declaration is available at http://www.irn.org/programs/rasi/index.asp?id=031204.rasidecl.html .
For information on purchasing reprints of this article, contact Tim Tobeck ttobeck@energycentral.com. Copyright 2010 CyberTech, Inc.
I agree with this article in one respect. The needs of the people who will be uprooted (or otherwise affected) by the creation of large dams (and their resulting artificial lakes) should be addressed to a much greater extent than they are now. Substantial compensation, and mechanisms to aid them in their transitions, should be provided. I'll agree that this is almost certainly sorely lacking, especially with the developing-nation governments in question.
However, given that the article seems to argue that these hydro projects should not proceed, that is where my agreement pretty much ends. I strongly favor the complete development of all of the world's sites with large-scale hydro potential, as hydro is clearly a RELATIVELY low-cost and low environmental impact energy source.
Once built, dams generate power at a very low (and very stable) cost, over a very long time frame (i.e., it is basically "renewable"). It is also fully domestic, and generates no air pollution and no CO2 emissions. Air pollution (and its horrible associated health effects) and global warming are both far more significant environmental problems than are any issues associated with hydro. Dams can also act like massive energy storage devices (by letting the reservoir rise or fall). Thus, they can be used to smooth out the effects of intermittant capacity from renewable sources (such as wind) and thus allow much greater market penetration for those sources.
Just about the only "problem" with hydro power is that there is only a finite quantity of it (in the world) that can be developed. It's one of the most desirable sources, but we only "get" so much. Thus, I view our finite set of large-scale hydro sites as "gifts from God" that should be used to the fullest. God knows the US sure did. Any regrets? Not many. To voluntarily not make use of this gift is insane.
It seems that there are still many people who are unclear on the concept that the energy not produced by hydro will have to come from somewhere else. In most cases the energy will come from fossil fuels, especially coal (the worst major energy source, with respect to the environment). This is even more true in the developing world, where exponential growth, primarily powered by coal, is expected.
China is an excellent example. The emission-free power coming from the Three Gorges dam is one of the few bright spots in China's energy situation (and future), with massive expected growth in demand and the great majority of new power coming from coal. There is very little nuclear (~3% now, perhaps ~10% by 2020) and there may be some gas, but future high gas costs will probably limit its use. Due to this situation, and similar developing world situations, hopes for limiting future CO2 emissions look quite bleak.
From the article:
"While dam critics believe that the answer to climate change lies in reducing wasteful consumption in the North..."
This statement is hopelessly naive, and is basically an intellectual cop out. Even under the most agressive scenarios for power conservation entertained by any legitimate expert, the best we can hope for is to merely reduce (perhaps cut in half) the rate of GROWTH in energy consumption in the North. In the developing world, the situation is far worse, with economic outputs and associated energy consumption growing at rapid rates. The potential contribution from non-hydro renewables is significant but limited.
The bottom line is that no serious person can envision a scenario where traditional energy sources (fossil/hydro/nuclear) do not grow at a rapid rate in the developing world. Thus, if the dams are not built, that energy will be produced by some other traditional source, most likely coal, pretty much on a one-for-one basis. One GW less hydro; one GW more coal, period.
Given that it is absolutely clear that the alternative sources (especially coal) carry much higher environmental, social, and public health costs, it would be very bad policy not to develop all of our potential hydro sources. (The above assertion is backed up by all scientific studies concerning the relative "external" costs of various energy sources, by the way.) Indeed, I don't even think it's accurate to say dams "harm" the environment. They just "change" it. I'm still waiting for someone to explain to be why artificial lakes (created by dams) are a bad thing whereas natural lakes (created by equivalent natural rock formations) are a bad thing. Once they've been around for awhile, these lakes will come to be thought of as natural features, and drainng them will not be desired any more then draining a natural lake (by changing the natural landscape) would.
Given all of the above, I tend to view the efforts by these groups to actually stop these dam projects as rather selfish. Instead, they should be fighting to ensure that the people adversely affected by such projects are adequately compensated, and given appropriate a
James Hopf 2.1.04
continued.......
.....and given appropriate aid to offset the adjustements they will have to make.
