[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

DAM-L earthquakes and Dams



----- Forwarded message from owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net -----

Return-path: <owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net>
Received: from noxmail.sandelman.ottawa.on.ca (nox.sandelman.ottawa.on.ca [192.139.46.6])
	by lox.sandelman.ottawa.on.ca (8.8.7/8.8.8) with ESMTP id OAA24202
	for <dianne@pophost.sandelman.ottawa.on.ca>; Thu, 1 Nov 2001 14:03:03 -0500 (EST)
From: owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net
Received: from calcutta1.flora.ca (calcutta1.flora.ca [209.195.78.66])
	by noxmail.sandelman.ottawa.on.ca (8.11.6/8.11.6) with ESMTP id fA1J3GR09171
	for <dianne@sandelman.ottawa.on.ca>; Thu, 1 Nov 2001 14:03:17 -0500 (EST)
Received: from DaVinci.NetVista.net (IDENT:mjdomo@mail.netvista.net [206.170.46.10])
	by calcutta1.flora.ca (8.11.6/8.11.6) with ESMTP id fA1J38917884
	for <dianne@sandelman.ottawa.on.ca>; Thu, 1 Nov 2001 14:03:09 -0500
Received: [(from mjdomo@localhost)
	by DaVinci.NetVista.net (8.10.0/8.8.8) id fA1ImNd22222
	for irn-narmada-list; Thu, 1 Nov 2001 10:48:23 -0800 (PST)
	(envelope-from owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net)]
Date: Thu, 1 Nov 2001 10:48:23 -0800 (PST)
Message-ID: <200111011848.fA1ImNd22222@DaVinci.NetVista.net>
Subject: LS: DISASTER DAMS
Sender: owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net
Precedence: bulk

THE STATESMAN Friday 27 July 2001: NB plus

                                         DISASTER DAMS

Will the dams on the River Teesta unleash killer earthquakes in the
hills?
Asks Neelkamal Chettri

On 20 November last year, the West Bengal Government and the National
Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC) signed an agreement. The whole
idea was to exploit the natural resources of the Teesta River by
building two dams between Melli and Coronation Bridge and generate
electricity.
As per the agreement, the NHPC will construct and operate two dams, one
of 100MW and the other of 132 MW under their Teesta Lower Dam Project.
At present, the project is in the survey and investigation stage and
scheduled to be completed by 2007.
According to the MOU, 12 per cent of the electricity generated annually
will be distributed freely by the NHPC and fed into the local grid of
the West Bengal State Electricity Board. The balance 88 per cent will be
sold by the NHPC. Nearly eight months have passed since the MOU was
signed. Surprisingly there is an acute shortage of information regarding
this project with the hill societies living in the upstream catchment
areas of the project. There seems to be a strategy to control the
dissemination of project related information. Not a single article on
the signing of the MOU between NHPC and the West Bengal Government has
found places in the columns of English or Nepali newspapers been
published. But practically every stage of NHPC’s project in Sikkim is
publicized. The media is covering it extensively.
What could be the motives behind this strategy? Why aren’t the planners
and the decision makers of this project educating those who live in the
highly seismic and landslide-prone upstream catchment areas on the
socio-economic and the environmental impact that these two dams will
have on our fragile ecosystem and on the hill economy?
The issue here is about project related development. Will the
development be sustainable and not at our expense. Pawan Chamling, chief
minister of Sikkim, has been raising the same issue for quite some time.
We must know how this project, budgeted at Rs 1,600, will boost the hill
economy? Will these dams have a positive economic impact on our hill
economy?
At present, Jaldhaka and Chukha supply electricity to Kalimpong
sub-division, while Darjeeling and Kurseong are fed by the Rammam Valley
Project. The increasing demand for electricity in the DGHC areas totally
outstrips supply and this is why we rarely get electricity in our homes,
offices and schools at 220 volts. The residents have to use voltage
stabilizers in the evening to step up the power. Will any of the 12 per
cent electricity that will be distributed freely by NHPC flow into that
grid that supplies electricity to our homes, offices and factories? Or
will the entire electricity flow in to the grid that supplies Siliguri
and Jalpaiguri? The other issue that is relevant to the long-term
survival of the hill people and the continuous development of the
economy is the socio-economic and the environmental impact the project
has on our ecosystem.
The local political leaders and NGOs have handled the environmental
aspect and made sure that polythene bags are banned. Unfortunately, none
of them has really done anything on the devastating impact these
projects will have on our eco-system.
The two dams once completed will submerge the nearby areas. The issue is
how large this submersion will be. There is no information on the areas
that these two dams will submerge or the number of villages that will
have to be relocated or the areas where they will be rehabilitated or
the impact it will have on the existing road/communication network.
This is the first time that the fast flowing, glacier-fed River Teesta
is being harnessed and its flow being controlled at a number of places.
What will be the cumulative impact of all these dams with those millions
of cubic liters of water stored, over the next 25 years on our highly
vulnerable ecosystem? Has the NHPC given any thought on this vital
aspect?
The disaster management strategy for the project is focused downstream
and based on the premise that should the dam burst, the accumulated
water would wash away the roads and bridges and inundate downstream
areas. It fails to consider the impact of the disaster upstream.
Aren’t there any possibilities of disasters happening in the upstream
catchment areas? Or are the project planners so confident that no
disaster influenced or catalysed by these two dams, will strike in the
upstream catchment areas? Is it because we do not figure at all in the
project planning and disaster management strategies? Are our lives so
dispensable?
The critical issue here is the probability that these dams may have in
catalyzing the seismic activity in the upstream catchment areas. The
Himalayan range, in which we all live in, is the world’s youngest
mountain range and is growing at the rate of 2 cms every year. This
makes it highly vulnerable and is compounded by the fact that it lies in
the seismic zone-4 (and which has been recently upgraded to level 5.) To
cap it all, Lava and the surrounding areas are said to be seismically
active.
North Bengal University is conducting a study. Unfortunately, its
research does not focus much on the impact on seismic activity, as the
university possesses neither the equipment nor the skills needed for
such a study. The Geographical Survey of India (GSI) is the only
organization that is equipped for such a job, but unfortunately, it does
not have any role in this assessment study.  Is the NHPC feeling the
pinch so badly? The area around the proposed dams in the past saw
unbridled uses of explosives during the British Raj when they had been
carving out road and rail links between Siliguri and Teesta.
Only after two attempts were they finally able to build the existing
road link. The same mountains were once again blasted when the British
government decided to extend the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway from
Siliguri to Reang River. How disturbed this stretch is can be gauged
from the fact that landslips or landslide hits every monsoon a new area.

Often heavy and persistent rain causes killer landslides. But this
coupled with an earthquake will wreck havoc on man and nature. On 2
October 1968, heavy rain hit the Kalimpong areas and continued for 72
hours. It rained so heavily that on the night of 3 October, water pipes
supplying water from the Delo Reservoir burst open and washed away
countless lives in the areas above 11th Mile.
What is more frightening (in today’s context) is that on the night of 3
October, an earthquake struck the area that triggered killer landslides
in and around Kalimpong resulting in a lot of casualties and loss of
property. The Teesta Bridge was washed away and for more than a month,
Kalimpong and Sikkim were cut off from the rest of the world. Even
today, people who experienced the 1968 disaster in Kalimpong, quiver
with fear and pray that no earthquake strikes the area during monsoons.
Recently, data has been found connecting the devastating earthquakes of
Latur in Maharashtra and Tehri-Garhwal in Uttaranchal to the
construction of dams at the nearby River Koyna and Tehri respectively.
Will such a disaster strike us in the coming future?
The NHPC, the state government and the people involved in the project
need to come clean and publish the necessary information about the
project. Otherwise, the project, once completed without incorporating
these safety and security issues, will remain like the
Sword of Damocles hanging above the hill peoples’ heads.
The people in the hills must take a decision. Do they need a project
that offers them no real-term economic benefits and which only threatens
their existence? After all, they are the only ones who do not have the
option to leave their homes.



-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from this list, send a message to majordomo@netvista.net
with no subject and the following text in the body of the message
"unsubscribe irn-narmada".

----- End of forwarded message from owner-irn-narmada@netvista.net -----