The MRC urges states to come up with an “integrated river management plans to address risks from increasing hydropower development”. The warning reflects the lack of collective action to address the threat to the Mekong River that is the damming of its course.
Category: Region
Selected environmental stories from media outlets in the Mekong region and beyond.
At COP26, Vietnam must stress peril of rising sea levels
Despite government pledges to spend in excess of $345 million on anti-flood projects, the predicted sea-level rise and intense storm surges will require multilateral support, and breakthroughs on adaptation and resilience.
Thai water project clears major hurdle after China shows interest
Thailand’s sudden blessing of the Yuam River project’s environmental impact assessment may also suggest that the government is starting to relax its typically wary view of China’s BRI push across Southeast Asia.
Destination Mekong Summit discusses a sustainable tourism
Titled “Re-start, Re-form, Re-balance”, the summit looked at how the tourism sector could recover from the Coronavirus pandemic, which forced governments to shut their borders and restrict movement around their countries
Vietnam’s addiction to coal shows tough climate choices developing Asia faces on emissions pledges
Vietnam’s draft power development plan, which GreenID has urged the trade ministry to revise, is at odds with the global shift towards phasing out coal and reaching net-zero carbon.
British ambassador calls for a greater push for renewable energy
Cambodia is not a big emitter of emissions but I would like to see an even greater push towards renewable energy. It is clear that coal is a dying commodity and those that have investments in that sector will have inefficient, expensive and stranded assets within the decade.
Climate-Smart Maps and Adaptation Plans (CS-MAP) launched
CS-MAP integrates local knowledge and science-based research to provide location-specific risk maps and adaptation plans for rice production. The project currently covers five ecological regions of Vietnam and was developed by the Ministry’s Crops Production Department and CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security in Southeast Asia (CCAFS SEA).
Red Flag River and China’s downstream neighbors
The Red Flag River’s proposed diversion of 21 percent of water from the upper streams of three transnational rivers (Mekong, Salween, and Brahmaputra) may be seen as a controversial issue. However, the proposed impact is actually very small. In the case of the Mekong, the discharge from the river’s upper stream accounts for just 2.96 percent of the the river’s total discharge.
China ramps up electricity imports from North Korea, Russia, Myanmar in bid to ease power crisis
The power is being generated by the Chinese-built Dapein (1) hydropower station located near Bhamo, a trading hub in northern Myanmar, according to people familiar with the matter.