Fisheries

Article on the history of the Madeira River complex, and the Brazilian government´s efforts to gain approval for the project, no matter what the cost.

Opinion piece published by Reuters AlertNet A Lao man, his face and hands hardened by the sun and years of fishing, tends his water buffalo by the Theun River and wonders what his life will be like "after the flood". That's how he referred to the water that has now started rising behind the Nam Theun 2 dam, turning an area more than four times the size of Paris - including the land his family has tilled for generations - into a stagnant reservoir. Will he, and the more than 6,000 others who have been displaced, be better off thanks to the Nam Theun 2 hydropower project, as the Lao government,

Opinion piece published in Thailand's The Nation A Lao man, his face and hands hardened by the sun after years of fishing and farming, tends his water buffalo by the Theun River and wonders what his life will be like "after the flood". That's how he referred to the water that has now started rising behind the Nam Theun 2 dam in central Laos. Will he, and the thousands of others who have been displaced, be better off thanks to the Nam Theun 2 hydropower project, as the Lao government, the dam developers and the World Bank contend? Or will he and his children face an uncertain future of rice sho

Muddy Waters: Impacts of Damming the Amazon's Principal TributaryPrefaceThe articles in this book are intended to serve as a tool for those who seek to better understand the Madeira River hydroelectric and industrial waterway complex (hidrovia), its history, and its implications for the Amazon region. The initiative to publish this book came from the non-governmental organization Bank Information Center, headquartered in Washington DC, as part of the studies on the projects of greatest impact in the Initiative for the Integration of South American Regional Infrastructure (IIRSA) for its BICECA

This review of the August 2007 drafts of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) and Environmental Management and Monitoring Plan for the Theun-Hinboun Expansion Project was conducted by independent researcher David Blake. According to Blake, the EIA fails to adequately examine impacts from the existing Theun-Hinboun Hydropower Project such as loss of land from erosion and increased flooding. These impacts will only intensify under the expansion project. Nor does it discuss the extent to which mitigation and compensation measures implemented to date have dealt with the impacts. The review co

March 2008 World Rivers ReviewNew studies confirm that fish ladders at dams in the tropics fail to meet their objective of guaranteeing the survival of migratory fish, and in fact could hasten the extinction of some species. Brazilian scientists found that ladders act as an "ecological trap," attracting schools of fish to poorer environments, and making it even more difficult for them to reproduce. Researchers studying a major dam built on the Tocantins River found that 16 migratory species were attracted by the turbulence of the water at the Lajeado Dam´s 874-meter-long fish ladder, built t

Poor sector planning, lack of public participation aggravate social and environmental impacts described in ADB report A report presented in Vientiane today on the cumulative impacts of hydropower development in Laos' Nam Ngum river basin indicates that proposed dams would have serious impacts on the livelihoods of tens of thousands of Laotians. But the flawed planning process makes it unlikely that this Asian Development Bank (ADB)-supported cumulative impact assessment (CIA) will have any influence over decisions taken on whether or how to proceed with these hydropower schemes. The CIA con

From December 2007 World Rivers Review This rainy season, a mushy mess is sliding down the Changuinola River Valley. Huge Volvo machines are tearing up old mountain roads, causing tons of chocolate-brown run-off to flow into nearby streams. The giant machines, operated by Panamanians and other Latinos, are opening new roads for the construction of the first of four large dams planned for this basin. About 100 new houses are being built for the dam's laborers, and a dozen finer homes for the project managers from Vattenfall, a Swedish construction company. The explosion of dam constr