Landslide in Tibet: Both India and China have reasons to worry about

My article Landslide in Tibet: Both India and China have reasons to worry about appeared in Mail Today and DailyO

Here is the link...
 
Construction of the proposed railway between Sichuan and Tibet could lead to similar disasters. Arunachal Pradesh and Assam would have to bear the brunt.

Some recent happenings on the Tibetan plateau have serious implications for India; in particular the devastating landslide on the Yarlung Tsangpo, a river which becomes the Siang in Arunachal Pradesh and the Brahmaputra in Assam.

    A barrier lake has formed after a landslide hit the Yarlung Tsangpo River in SW China's Tibet on Wednesday morning. The safe evacuation of local residents is being carried out pic.twitter.com/5rtFXoANMG
    — China Xinhua News (@XHNews) October 17, 2018

Landslide in Tibet
On October 11, Xinhua reported that a ‘barrier lake’ had formed on a section of another river, the Upper Yangtze (Jinsha River in Chinese); the mishap was due a landslide which had taken place in Jomda county of Chamdo prefecture in the Tibet Autonomous Region.
Though no casualties were reported, the amount of water in the new lake reached about 100 million cubic metres in a short time.
The Chinese media affirmed: “the scale of the landslide is vast, clogging the main waterway of the Jinsha River, with several bridges, fields and villages affected."
Was it a coincidence — but the same day, President Xi Jinping chaired an ‘important’ meeting called to improve disaster prevention, which could be triggered by the mega Sichuan-Tibet railway project, planned to cross the same ecologicallyfragile area? If the project is realised, it could undoubtedly result in unthinkable environmental damages.
During the meeting, Xi “called for efforts to improve the country’s ability to safeguard against natural disasters, and fully launch the planning and construction of the Sichuan-Tibet railway".
The Party’s general secretary promised “to protect people’s lives and property and national security.”
Six days later, Xinhua reported the formation of a new lake on the Yarlung Tsangpo, not far from the Great Bend of the river, north of Arunachal Pradesh.
“A barrier lake has formed after a landslide struck a section of the Brahmaputra Valley near Pe Village of Mainling County,” said The Telegraph.
China’s water resources ministry immediately informed Delhi of the seriousness of the situation; emergency bells rang downstream, particularly in the Upper Siang district.
All this raises serious issues for India …and for China.

    The evacuation of more than 10,000 people in SW China's Tibet Autonomous Region is underway following a landslide that blocked a major river in the region, local authorities said on Thursday. pic.twitter.com/fGxHK54WTb
    — People's Daily,China (@PDChina) October 18, 2018

During the meeting chaired by the Chinese president to discuss the SichuanTibet railway, Xi spoke of “profound significance for the country's long-term stability and the development of Tibet.”
Three members of the all-powerful Politburo’s Standing Committee were in attendance: Premier Li Keqiang, Wang Huning and Vice-Premier Han Zheng.
Xinhua commented that China was one of the most disaster-prone countries in the world. “…But its overall capability to respond to such extreme conditions is still relatively weak, and more should be done.”
It had earlier been rumoured that there was a rift between the Chinese President and his Premier, who in July, had visited Tibet in rather strange circumstances, probably to inspect a section of the projected mega railway line. While Xi seems in favour of going full steam on mega projects, his Premier believes in a more human (and less energy consuming) approach.

    Siang river is a very big river & when there are some natural calamities like earthquakes or landslides, it possess danger to people who live downstream: Union Minister Kiren Rijiju on Brahmaputra river blockage caused due to a landslide in Tibet pic.twitter.com/7d79CvORPv
    — ANI (@ANI) October 20, 2018

Cost of mega projects
An article in The Wall Street Journal indicates that a serious debate is raging in the Middle Kingdom and Beijing was trying “to kick its habit of using big-ticket infrastructure spending to fuel the economy, a turning point from a growth model...”.
One of the problems is of course the environmental consequences, especially in ecologically-fragile areas, but the other issue is: who will pay the cost of these pharaonic schemes?
Further, an improvement in the protection of the environment will come at a price; the cost of certain projects like the railway between Sichuan and Tibet may increase many folds.
One of the questions never mentioned in the Chinese press is: can Beijing today afford these mega projects?
What would be the usefulness of a railway line between Sichuan and Lhasa, when excellent highways exist?
The meeting chaired by the Chinese President just said that “it will promote ethnic solidarity, safeguard national unity and consolidate the stability of the frontier, as well as bolster Tibet's economic and social development.” There is no doubt that in the mind of Xi Jinping, the chairman of the Central Military Commission, the ‘consolidation of the frontiers’, (i.e. the Indian border), is crucial.

Ecological approach
A few months ago, The China Daily provided some details of the project: “A preliminary study on the Kangding-Nyingchi section of the Sichuan-Tibet Railway shows the section will include at least 10 rail tunnels each longer than 10 kilometres.”
The China Daily commented: “Since the new line will have to go through intricate and difficult geological conditions, and its construction will have to overcome frozen earth, landslides and rock slides, experts have dubbed the Sichuan-Tibet Railway China’s most challenging rail project.”
The recent landslides are an example of what could (will) happen to the railway line; the construction in such difficult terrain is bound to create havoc for the Tibetan plateau’s environment.
A more ‘ecological’ approach is bound to drastically increase the cost of the project; it is where Li may not fully agree with the Emperor.
As for India downstream, though the waters have started receding, the happenings on the Yarlung Tsangpo are truly worrisome.
Several years ago, a map of the prospective largest hydropower plant in the world, more than twice the capacity of the Three Gorges Dam, had circulated.
The departure point was where the landslide has just taken place last week, while the hydropower station was located in Metok, a few kilometres north of Arunachal.
Is this project still on the cards? It would certainly spell disasters in the making for India. Let us hope that wisdom will prevail.

Is the Zangmu dam 'clean'?

The Zangmu hydropower plant

This is in continuation to my previous post on the new electricity grid recently launched between Chamdo and Sichuan.
I raised the question: once the dams on the Brahmaputra are complete, will this (grid) investment be used to send electricity from Tibet to Sichuan or vice-versa.
We shall know soon, as the first run-of-river hydropower plant at Zangmu on the Yarlung Tsangpo, (which becomes the Siang and later on the Brahmaputra), is now operational.
Xinhua announced yesterday: "Tibet's largest hydropower station became partly operational, harnessing the rich water resources of the Yarlung Zangbo [Tsangpo] River to develop the electricity-strapped region."
It is the first generating unit of the  Zangmu Hydropower Station (costing 1.5 billion U.S. dollars). The project is located at 3,300 meters above sea level.
Xinhua says that "five other generating units are due for completion no later than next year", adding "the huge project, which straddles the middle reaches of the roaring Yarlung Tsangpo River, will have a total installed capacity of 510,000 kilowatts [510 Mws] upon completion. It is designed to generate 2.5 billion kilowatt hours of electricity annually."
According to Chinese official statistics, Tibet's per capita electricity consumption in 2013 was slightly over 1,000 kilowatt hours, less than one third of the national average.
Will the entire production of electricity of the 5 'officially' planned dams on the Tsangpo be used on the Tibetan plateau or will it be sent to the mainland?
The official news agency is obviously mum on the subject, though Liu Xiaoming, an official of the State Grid's Tibet Electric Power Co affirms: "The hydropower station will solve Tibet's power shortage, especially in the winter."
Tibet's Development and Reform Commission (local Planning Commission) asserts that "the region's installed power generating capacity was 1.48 million kilowatts.Tibet has annual water resources totaling 448.2 billion cubic meters, with potential water power resources reaching 201.36 million kilowatts. It holds nearly 30 percent of the nation's total water power resources."
It is a boon or a curse for the Roof of the World?
And what about the environment?
Though Lobsang Gyaltsen, the head of the Tibetan government declared: "The region has strived to protect the environment throughout construction. The hydroplant is a good example of clean energy development," run-of-river plants are not today considered 'clean' anymore.
There is no doubt that the life of the river between the 'intake' of the diversion and the power station downstream will be badly affected. 
One has recently seen the negative consequences of the 'run-of-river' plants in Uttarakhand (see my post, Dam is money, dam is destruction too).

Sketch showing the principle of
a run-of-river hydropower plant.
What happens to the life of the river
between the intake and the power house?

The Xinhua communique affirms: "A total of 320 million yuan has been invested in the Zangmu hydroplant project to build environmental friendly facilities such as sewage treatment plants, garbage recycling stations and fish protection stations."
Will China let environmentalists visit the site and study the state of the river before the diversion and after the power station?
I doubt.
According to Bo Lunzhang, an official of the regional environmental protection bureau. "The Yarlung Tsangpo River requires much higher protection standard than any other rivers in China, and the experience of Zangmu station may be learnt by other hydropower projects in Tibet."
China may learn from the Zangmu experience, but run-of-river plants elsewhere in India and the world have been very damaging for the environment (the aquatic life of the river for example).
Will the waters entering Upper Siang district of Arunachal Pradesh be different now?
India should carefully and scientifically monitor, not only the flow of the Siang, but also the quality of the water.
Article 12 of the 'Implementation Plan' signed in June 2014 between Indian and China for providing 'Hydrological Information of the Yarlung Zangbu/ Brahmaputra River in Flood Season by China to India' says: "In order to ensure normal provision of hydrological information, if necessary, after mutual consultation through diplomatic channel, the parties may dispatch hydrological experts to each other’s country to conduct study tour according to the principle of reciprocity."
Why can't Delhi ask Beijing's permission to send a team of hydrological experts to visit the dam and get some clarity on what is going on?

A stupid argument: dam for dam

I find this argument (dam for dam) as one of the most stupid that one can imagine. It has come from the brains of bureaucrats and politicians who have vested interests in the construction of the dam. 
It is surprising that The Economic Times uses this argument.
The pro-dams are probably thinking to take refugee behind the ‘First User’ rights on water flowing from across the border. Unfortunately, as a NGO River Basin Friends points out: "this logic defies the ground realities in absence of an international law on uses of trans-national rivers as much as absence of any binding and tenable treaty with Chinese government."
The NGO further explains: "A report by the Technical Expert Group on Brahmaputra Water Diversion (TEGBW) in early 2009 stated that average water contribution of Chinese river to Brahmaputra is just about 78.10 billion cubic meters (BCM). Although repeatedly Chinese have denied any plan to divert water from Brahmaputra towards its North Western Provinces, yet National Technical Research Organization (NTRO) confirms the Chinese plan to divert billions of cubic metres of water. Ministry of External Affairs had also endorsed the view that China has every reason to divert water to save time and cost towards water starved North Western Provinces. All claims and counter claims have been put to rest on Indian side by National Remote Sensing Agency (NRSA). NRSA’s report released in November 2007 indicated that construction in the Chinese area has further progressed in 3 out of 9 structures reported in Brahmaputra basin. As per an assessment report by the TEGBWD, this will reduce average inflow of water by 71.4 BCM into Brahmaputra River at the Chinese observation site called Nuxia. In commercial term for hydro developers, this would reduce the power generation capacity at Lower Siang Project to half and Siang Upper Project by one sixth."
The main point is that Delhi needs to sign a Water Treaty with Beijing regarding not only the Yarlung Tsangpo/Brahmaputra, but all the rivers originating from Tibet.
 

Dam for dam in Arunachal
Economic Times
6 Aug 2010,
Urmi A Goswami,
NEW DELHI: India will fast track hydro power projects in Arunachal Pradesh to counter the Chinese buildup in the area. China is developing a hydel project on the Yarlung Tsangpo in Tibet. Beijing may have assured that the project would not impact the flow of the river into India, but New Delhi is not sitting back. It is focusing on setting up projects on the Siang River, which what the Yarlung Tsangpo is known as after it enters India in Arunachal Pradesh.
This is what gives the Siang basin its strategic significance from an international point of view. Developing the Siang basin will strengthen India’s negotiating position with China. Till now, India has concentrated on the Subasari and Dibang basins.
In view of its importance, the environment ministry has made a commitment to the prime minister that it would put environment and forest clearance for the Siang river basin projects on a special track. As a first step it has already set out the terms of reference for the 2,700MW project by the JP group in lower Siang. The developer will now have to prepare an environment impact assessment report.
The Siang basin has a potential for 20,000 MW, of which only three specific projects with a total capacity of 11,000 MW have been identified. Each of these is at a preliminary stage. The environment ministry is understood to have made a written offer to the power ministry that it would clear these projects in an expeditious manner given their strategic importance.
Upper Siang project likely to be relocated on Chinese concernsth a capacity of 1,600 MW) and the Siang Middle Project (with a capacity of 1,000 MW) in Arunachal Pradesh. The government is considering the suggestion to provide more attractive rehabilitation packages and even additional incentives to the Arunchal Pradesh government to ensure that projects can be implemented smoothly. Given the these projects would improve India’s negotiating stand, in the face of relentless buildup by China, the matter is also being discussed by the group of ministers discussing the external interface on energy security. India and China have no water agreements. As a result there is no structured international convention under which India can appeal should its lower riparian rights be affected by the power projects on the Tsangpo river. In this context, developing the Siang basin provides India the best the safeguard.