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dam-l Namib. wind power a first/LS
>From Environmental News Service:
Namibian Wind Power a First for Southern Africa
By Nellie Brand
WINDHOEK, Namibia, March 4, 1999 (ENS) -
The Namibian Ministry of Mines and Energy has announced
that the country is going to go ahead and
build the first wind power generating station in Southern Africa. The
10MW wind power station will be constructed
in the small southern Namibian town of Lüderitz on the coast of the
Atlantic Ocean.
Lüderitz (Photo courtesy Hotel Zum
Sperrgebiet)
The
old town was built where diamonds were first
discovered in Namibia at the turn of the century
and
was the first German settlement in the country.
Today
it consists of a small fishing and resort
community. One road straight through the desert
connects Lüderitz with Windhoek hundreds of
miles
to the north.
The
Ministry of Mines and Energy has just
published a White Paper on Energy stating that it
wants
to develop all possible energy resources.
That
includes the Epupa dam and hydropower
station on one of the few perennial rivers in
Namibia, the Kunene.
There is a lot of controversy surrounding
the project, but a feasibiility study was finished last year.
Himba women (Photo courtesy Africa Interlink)
Consultation with the semi-nomadic Himba
indigenous people living
in the area came to a stop two years ago
because they are totally
against the project. The government now
says it is committed to
continuing consultation with the Himba
before a decision is taken on
the Epupa hydropower plan.
Epupa Dam is being proposed primarily for
hydropower and is
projected to provide 360 MW of electricity.
It would be a
160-meter-high dam that would flood 250
square kilometers, including
Epupa Falls, grazing lands, and sacred
sites of the Himba. Several
thousand Himba people would be affected and
would need to leave
their homelands at Epupa Falls.
Because the river is shared with Angola,
Namibia is still waiting for a
response by their government about the
project. The two governments
apparently disagree on where on the Kunene
River to build the project.
Epupa
Falls
(Photo
courtesy Africa Interlink)
The
feasibility study calls the Angolan
government's plan more environmentally friendly
and
people friendly. It says the Namibian location
is the
more economic viable option, but very
destructive for the environment and the people
living
there.
Other
alternatives, such as natural gas projects,
desalinization, and renewable forms of power
generation would be cheaper than Epupa Dam and
have
less social and environmental impacts.
In the
meantime, Namibia also finished its climate
change
study required by the United Nations
Framework Convention on Climate Change. The
study states that Namibia, like the other countries in Southern
Africa, does not emit much greenhouse gas,
but is extremely vulnerable to future global warming due to its dry
climate.
The Namib Desert is the oldest living
desert in the
world. (Photo courtesy Namibia Travel
Connection)
Namibia has already experienced some change
during the past
decade - lower rainfall, more variable
rainfall and higher
temperatures.
The Ministry of Environment and Tourism is
now starting an
awareness campaign for the country in
general and for
decisionmakers. The government is expected
to start
implementing measures that will lessen the
impact of global
warming on this desert country. The sector
that will be most
affected is the water sector where big
problems regarding
scarcity already exist in Namibia.
© Environment News Service (ENS) 1999. All
Rights Reserved.
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Lori Pottinger, Director, Southern Africa Program,
and Editor, World Rivers Review
International Rivers Network
1847 Berkeley Way, Berkeley, California 94703, USA
Tel. (510) 848 1155 Fax (510) 848 1008
http://www.irn.org
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