In the past few years, resentment has been rising over the emerging Chinese hydro power projects in Tibet among India, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos and many other countries that share rivers originating in Tibet. Due to fears of potential water and energy stress/scarcity within China, these projects are critical to its economic development in the coming decades. The 12th Five Year Plan of China calls for a major increase in the production of hydropower, and the rivers originating in Tibet would be at the centre of hydropower production activities. Currently, China’s technical exploitable hydro power amounts to 542 million kW and crucially less than 30 percent of China’s hydro power has been utilized. In the 12th Five Year Plan, China is aiming to set up more and more hydropower projects on key rivers, by which the country’s installed capacity is anticipated to reach 290 million kW by 2015.
More than 60 percent of its water comes from the South, particularly Tibet. Also, the major rivers in Tibet have remained untamed until recently. Rivers in Tibet are likely to be used for few purposes which includes: firstly, to feed the energy intensive industries and population of northern China that possesses only 7 percent of the country’s total fresh water resources; and secondly, to generate electricity for the local residents and finally to fulfil the increasing requirements of a growing mining industry, which has recently entered Tibet to exploit and extract minerals like gold and copper. In short, waters in Tibet will be either dammed or diverted to northern China. He Haining and Jiang Yannan who work with the Southern Weekend have referred to this development as “A New Era for Tibet’s Rivers”.
China’s increasing hydropower projects in Tibet are likely to pose challenges to the downstream countries, particularly India. In a decade, water issue between the two neighbours is likely to emerge as another reason for confrontation. More than political relations, the socio-economic impacts driven by these hydropower projects remain a major concern for India.
Hydro Power Projects on the Yarlung Tsangpo
There are ten major rivers flowing from Tibet to 11 countries downstream. Rivers in Tibet, which flow to these countries feed the world’s largest (China), the second largest (India), and the seventh largest population (Bangladesh) as well as some of the Southeast Asian nations like Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia and Thailand. These rivers feed approximately 500 million people in Asia and 250 million people in China alone.
Yarlung Tsangpo is the longest river (2,900 kilometres) along the Tibetan Plateau and it takes an abrupt U-turn (called the “Great Bend”) and flows into India through Arunachal Pradesh, where it takes the name of ‘Brahmaputra’; it then flows further south to its mouth in Bangladesh. The river passes through a series of narrow gorges between Namcha Barwa (7,756metres) and Gyala Peri (7,294metres). At a length of around 240 kilometres, the Tsangpo plummets nearly 2,700 metres through what is commonly recognized as the Yarlung Tsangpo Grand Canyon, the world’s deepest gorge.
Hydropower projects in Tibet, particularly on the Yarlung Tsangpo have emerged as one of the most controversial issues between India and China. As of 2010, according to Tsering Tashi, a Tibetan scholar of environmental policy at the University of British Columbia, the status of dams along the upper stretches of the Yarlung Tsangpo-Brahmaputra shows that 10 dams have been completed, three are still under construction, seven are under active consideration and eight more dams have been proposed.
More recently three hydropower projects have repeatedly been reported and discussed. These are Zangmu, Motuo and Daduqia hydropower projects. China is reportedly expected to build a 38,000 MW hydropower plant at Motuo, much bigger than the Three Gorges Dam. The Daduqia project with an installed capacity of 42,000 MW is reported to be very close to the Indian border. A few other hydropower projects along the Tsangpo that the Chinese establishment has announced in 2013 include: the 640 MW Dagu Dam (which lies 18 kilometres upstream of Zangmu), the 320 MW Juice Dam (also on the middle stretches of the Brahmaputra downstream of Zangmu), and the Jiexu Dam (11 kilometres upstream of Zangmu); the content of the Jiexu dam is, as yet, unconfirmed.
Figure 1: Hydropower Projects on the Yarlung Tsangpo/Brahmaputra
Figure 2: The Western Water Diversion Line
Concerns for India
Water resources constitute an inalienable part of the developmental processes in India and China. Both the countries are not ready to compromise on the water front given the fact that the volume of renewable water resources in these two countries has reduced from 2,220 to 2,092 cubic metres per capita in China and 1,762 to 1,631 in India during 1998-2008. Also, in the past few decades, India and China have been plagued by droughts, earthquakes, floods and shortage of drinking water. Since India is dependent on the rivers that originate in China for one-third of its renewable energy resources, India is also concerned about probable water disputes between the two countries.
China’s hydropower projects in Tibet and concerns for India can be categorized into three aspects: socioeconomic, environmental and geopolitical. Firstly, in terms of environmental impacts, it has to be emphasized that the Yarlung Tsangpo Gorge being young and still active as a geological formation, any interference could have disastrous effects, from which the ecosystem may not be able to recover. Environmental and natural disasters like earthquake, landslide and other seismic activities are common in the region. The 2008 earthquake (7.9 magnitude) in Wenchuan killed 80,000 people and this seismic activity was reportedly caused by a dam project near the area. According to Tako Dabi, political advisor to Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Nabam Tuki, the causes of receding water levels in the river near Pasighat town was either due to the diversion of the course of the river or an artificial blockade as a result of dam building activities of China over the Yarlung Tsangpo. He further maintained that the water levels in the Siang, as noted on 9 June 2000, suddenly rose by 30 metres and inundated almost the entire township causing widespread destruction of property besides claiming seven lives following the collapse of a hydropower dam in Tibet. China was also blamed for floods in Himachal Pradesh in 2000, 2001 and 2005.
Apart from floods, construction of hydropower projects in Tibet could contribute to melting of glaciers in the region. According to the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, a unit of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the area and mass of the region’s glaciers has decreased by 7 percent since the late 1960s. It further reported that Tibet is heating up and temperatures in Tibet soared in 2009 to the highest level since records began. The average temperature in Tibet in 2009 was 5.9 degrees Celsius, 1.5 degrees higher than ‘normal’. Zhang Hezhen, a Lhasa resident and specialist at the regional weather bureau stated, “Average temperatures recorded at 29 observatories reached record highs. Further, a monitoring station at the foot of Mt Everest also recorded a new record high temperature of 25.8 degrees Celsius, which was 0.7 degrees warmer than the previous peak.”
The second major concern is potential socio-economic disaster caused by the construction of dams or other hydropower projects in Tibet. The socio-economic impacts could also lead to political tensions. For instance, in the case of hydropower projects, dam release is one of the serious issues. The timing of dam release is of critical importance for the downstream countries whose economy is dominated by agriculture or agricultural users. For instance, India is dependent on the Brahmaputra for 30 percent of the country’s water resources and 41 percent of its total hydropower resources. If dams are not released during the dry season, the water value downstream will reduce significantly and consequently will have an impact on downstream countries. Such developments may trigger political tensions between the countries. Apart from dam release, construction of dams is expected to remove nutrient-rich silt, which is vital for agriculture in India and Bangladesh. Since a vast number of people in these two countries are dependent on agriculture, such developments could pose serious threat to food security and inflict social and economic havoc. And without silt, salt water encroaches on estuaries and these become more vulnerable to rising sea levels. Take the case of dams on the Nu River due to which silt no longer reaches the Mekong Delta, and this has reportedly resulted in reduced fish stock in downstream countries such as Thailand. India and Bangladesh would face similar consequences soon if China succeeds in implementing its proposed projects.
Regarding geopolitical and security concerns, if China dams the rivers in Tibet that flow to other countries, this can be used as a tool for bargaining in diplomacy. Judith Curry argues that the monitoring, collection and sharing of flow data above and below dams can be used to help guide the operation of hydropower facilities so that they can simultaneously release water at the rates necessary to produce required power, as well as serve the needs of downstream communities even in the dry season.
Since there is no agreement, particularly related to water sharing or any transboundary agreement between China and countries which share rivers flowing from Tibet, the threat of temporal diversions with regard to dam construction on the Brahmaputra River remains a visceral threat that could become a significant source of regional instability under drought conditions. Brahma Chellaney and George Ginsburg have provided the same argument as well. They maintain that China’s hegemonic hold over the rivers in Tibet could be used as a political weapon that can be wielded overtly in a war or can be also used in peacetime to signal dissatisfaction with a state. Such developments threaten not only India but the entire Indian subcontinent. Perhaps this is the reason why China has so far not signed any bilateral treaty with regard to the utilization of water resources with any of its neighbours.
Rivers like the Yarlung Tsangpo, which originates in Tibet and flows into India are an integral part of the agricultural system and livelihood security of millions living in this country. Along with this fact, the three major concerns, mentioned above are inter-linked. Environmental impacts are directly linked to the socio-economic concerns, which may cause political tensions between and within the countries. Until today China had quietly drawn the issue in its favour by claiming that the water diversion projects are not meant for diversion and that they are run-of-the-river projects. However, if China continues to increase its hydropower activities in Tibet, the water issue between India and China will play a significant role in India-China relations in the next five to ten years.
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are personal.
Dolma Tsering, Researcher, Centre for East Asian Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University
