Chinese dams held back Mekong waters during drought, study finds

[webfact]

Chinese dams held back Mekong waters during drought, study finds

By Kay Johnson

 

FILE PHOTO: General view of Mekong river, Ban Namprai village, Nong Khai province, Thailand October 8, 2019. REUTERS/Panu Wongcha-um/File Photo

 

BANGKOK (Reuters) - China's Mekong River dams held back large amounts of water during a damaging drought in downstream countries last year despite China having higher-than-average water levels upstream, a U.S. research company said in a study.

 

China's government disputed the findings, saying there was low rainfall during last year's monsoon season on its portion of the 4,350-km (2,700-mile) river.

 

The findings by Eyes on Earth Inc., a research and consulting company specialising in water, published in a U.S.-government funded study, could complicate tricky discussions between China and other Mekong countries on how to manage the river that supports 60 million people as it flows past Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and through Cambodia and Vietnam.

 

Last year's drought, which saw the Lower Mekong at its lowest levels in more than 50 years, devastated farmers and fishermen and saw the massive river recede to expose sandbanks along some stretches and at others turned from its usual murky brown to bright blue https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mekong-river/green-algae-blue-water-add-to-fears-over-health-of-southeast-asias-mekong-idUSKBN1Z919K because waters were so shallow and lacking in sediment.

 

"If the Chinese are stating that they were not contributing to the drought, the data does not support that position,” said Alan Basist, a meteorologist and president of Eyes on Earth, which conducted the study with funding from the U.S. State Department's Lower Mekong Initiative.

 

Instead, satellite measurements of “surface wetness” in China’s Yunnan province, through which the Upper Mekong flows, suggest the region in 2019 actually had slightly above-average combined rainfall and snowmelt during the May to October wet season.

 

But water levels measured downstream from China along the Thai-Lao border were at times up to 3 metres (10 feet) lower than they should have been, the group said in the study.

 

That suggests China is "not letting the water out during the wet season, even when the restriction of water from China has a severe impact of the drought experienced downstream", Basist said.

 

TROUBLED WATERS

The effect of China's 11 dams on the upper Mekong has long been debated, but data has been scarce because China does not release detailed records of how much water the dams are using to fill their reservoirs, which Eyes on Earth says have a combined capacity of more than 47 billion cubic metres.

 

China - which has no formal water treaties with the lower Mekong countries - promised to cooperate https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mekong-river/china-says-will-help-manage-mekong-as-report-warns-of-dam-danger-idUSKBN20E20T on management of the river and also to investigate the causes of last year's record drought.

 

But the United States, which has been challenging China's growing influence in Southeast Asia, has said that Beijing essentially controls the Mekong. Last year in Bangkok, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo blamed the drought on "China’s decision to shut off water upstream".

 

The study used satellite data taken with Special Sensor Microwave Imager/Sounder (SSMI/S) technology to detect water on the surface from rain and snowmelt in China's portion of the Mekong River Basin from 1992 to late 2019.

 

It then compared that data with river-level readings by the Mekong River Commission at Thailand’s Chiang Saen Hydrological Station, the closest station to China, to create a predictive model of "natural" levels for the river given a certain amount of upstream rainfall and snowmelt.

 

In the early years of the data, from 1992, the predictive model and the river measurements tracked generally closely.

 

'UNREASONABLE'

But starting in 2012, when the larger of China’s upper Mekong hydropower dams came online, the model and the river level readings started to diverge most years, coinciding with periods of the Chinese dams’ reservoirs filling up during rainy seasons and releasing water during the dry season.

 

The difference was especially pronounced in 2019, Basist said.

 

The study focused only on waters flowing out of China, and did not look further downstream, where Laos https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mekong-river-dam/amid-hydropower-boom-laos-streams-ahead-on-latest-mekong-dam-idUSKBN2010B8 opened two new mainstream Mekong dams in late 2019. 

 

China dismissed the findings.

 

"The explanation that China's dam building on the Lancang River is causing downstream droughts is unreasonable," the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement to Reuters, referring to the river by its Chinese name.

 

The ministry said Yunnan province saw serious drought last year and reservoir volumes at China's dams on the river fell to their historically lowest levels.

 

“Despite this, China has continued to do its utmost to guarantee reasonable discharge volumes” to countries downstream, the ministry said.

 

That assertion, however, is inconsistent with the new study's data, said Brian Eyler, Southeast Asia programme director of the Stimson Center think-tank in Washington.

 

“Either Beijing is lying or their dam operators are lying to them. Somewhere, someone isn’t telling the truth," Eyler said.

 

(Additional reporting by David Stanway in Shanghai and Panu Wongcha-um in Bangkok; Writing by Kay Johnson; Editing by Robert Birsel)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2020-04-14

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[PatOngo]

9 minutes ago, webfact said:

“Either Beijing is lying or their dam operators are lying to them. Somewhere, someone isn’t telling the truth," Eyler said.

 

Somewhere, someone needs to get wise to the BS sprouted by Beijing! Their aggressive expansionist policy is gathering momentum by the day! Why are Beijing and Shanghai unaffected by the corona virus?

[misterjames]

This is why they follow the CCP on everything they know who holds the cards this is not the only way that they have been snookered. They either suck up to CCP or they turn the tap off and this is not the only thing the CCP holds over them so when the CCP says jump they say how high it's that simple.

[Damrongsak]

Money, power, natural resources, grab them all.  Get while the getting is good.  

 

Meanwhile, give me time to find some pics of Chinese sons driving Ferraris, Laborghinis & etc crashing into each other while racing drunkenly or incompently across town.

[Damrongsak]

2 hours ago, misterjames said:

This is why they follow the CCP on everything they know who holds the cards this is not the only way that they have been snookered. They either suck up to CCP or they turn the tap off and this is not the only thing the CCP holds over them so when the CCP says jump they say how high it's that simple.

Who hold the cards ...  yep!  Evil is afoot and alive.  Has been for thousands of years.

[canopy]

3 hours ago, webfact said:

The study focused only on waters flowing out of China, and did not look further downstream, where Laos

When you restrict your "study" to dig up dirt on China and ignore what other countries like Laos are doing to the Mekong it questions whether the results are fair and unbiased.

 

[PETERTHEEATER]

1 hour ago, Damrongsak said:

Money, power, natural resources, grab them all.  Get while the getting is good.  

 

Meanwhile, give me time to find some pics of Chinese sons driving Ferraris, Laborghinis & etc crashing into each other while racing drunkenly or incompently across town.

Red Bull will give you wings......

[PatOngo]

22 minutes ago, canopy said:

When you restrict your "study" to dig up dirt on China and ignore what other countries like Laos are doing to the Mekong it questions whether the results are fair and unbiased.

 

I'm sure Laos doesn't aspire to dominate the world!

[Assurancetourix]

47 minutes ago, canopy said:

When you restrict your "study" to dig up dirt on China and ignore what other countries like Laos are doing to the Mekong it questions whether the results are fair and unbiased.

 

is that a joke?
So it is in very bad taste.
Everyone except you knows very well that all the dams made on the Mekong in Laos are the work of the Chinese;
you just have to go and see;
the trucks are registered in China and the managers and workers are all Chinese

[terminatorchiangmai]

They needed a study for that?

let's set up a committee also to investigate the people that did the study.

[Yadon Toploy]

China has its boot firmly in the throat of South East Asia. 

 

By the time they wake up it will be too late and they will be colonised. 

[Oziex1]

3 hours ago, misterjames said:

This is why they follow the CCP on everything they know who holds the cards this is not the only way that they have been snookered. They either suck up to CCP or they turn the tap off and this is not the only thing the CCP holds over them so when the CCP says jump they say how high it's that simple.

Meanwhile in the West we jump to the USA and the Chinese.

[canopy]

 

52 minutes ago, PatOngo said:

I'm sure Laos doesn't aspire to dominate the world!

That is no excuse to turn a blind eye and give Laos or any other country along the Mekong a free pass to cause problems of any kind downstream. Every country along the Mekong should be treated equally and put under the same set of rules and scrutiny.

 

Edited April 14, 2020 by canopy

[The Deerhunter]

Surely not many people are surprised at this revelation.  Satellite photos taken over many months of the whole region hold the final truth, and I am guessing that is the simple and obvious evidence they are working on.

Ask NASA and ESA for comparable photos and compare THEM to Chinese ones!

Edited April 14, 2020 by The Deerhunter

[Isaan sailor]

Say goodbye to Mekong--but don't wait too long.  Very soon, just a long ditch for a northern boundary.   How could it have been different?   SE Asian countries could have banded together to stand up to CCP bullying.

[Assurancetourix]

1 minute ago, canopy said:

The Mekong deserves equal protection from all nations that share it.

    

Sorry, I'm not making fun of you but of what you just wrote.
This is what the "service idiots" think;
China, which has the sources of the Mekong, has always done what it wants with this river.
And will continue to do so unless there is a major cataclysm.
It is not the little ants that are Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam that will be able to thwart the first world power.

[Mark17AA]

And Thailand will welcome back these (beings), as I'm yet to find a fitting category that can be quoted.

 

Time the world stood up to there back handed bullying.

[canopy]

4 minutes ago, Assurancetourix said:

China, which has the sources of the Mekong, has always done what it wants with this river.

Laos is building 11 dams along the Mekong. China has 7 dams. So yeah let's all condemn China as we do exactly the same thing meanwhile we don't talk about it, do studies on it, and just pretend it isn't happening. I am for equality. No country should get a free pass to destroy the Mekong, period.

 

[Assurancetourix]

1 minute ago, canopy said:

Laos is building 11 dams along the Mekong. China has 7 dams.

No, China is building 11 dams on Mekong in Laos ...

And nearly 95 % of electricity produced by these dams is or will be sell to Thailand .

[Puchaiyank]

Thais and Cambodians were warned of the down stream problem which would result if the Chinese were allowed to dam up the mighty Mekong...

 

Too late now...damage is done!

[DPKANKAN]

5 hours ago, PatOngo said:

Somewhere, someone needs to get wise to the BS sprouted by Beijing! Their aggressive expansionist policy is gathering momentum by the day! Why are Beijing and Shanghai unaffected by the corona virus?

Plus the 'Whu Flu'????????????????????????????????

[canopy]

  

7 minutes ago, Assurancetourix said:

No, China is building 11 dams on Mekong in Laos ...

Parts or even all of the computer you are using to write with were probably built by Chinese. It was your choice to buy the product. It's simply smart business by Laos to leverage the incredible know how next door. China has excellence in engineering and experiences with dams. What would you have Laos do, try start from scratch which would be a far more expensive and lengthy procedure to try to achieve the same thing and probably come up way short? Even America looks to outsource mega projects to China. Stop playing the Chinese card, it doesn't hold up.

 

7 minutes ago, Assurancetourix said:

And nearly 95 % of electricity produced by these dams is or will be sell to Thailand

Big deal. Is that some sort of excuse that we shouldn't study it to make sure Laos doesn't become the giant wrecking ball of the Mekong with 11 massive dams on it? By not studying other countries dams it questions what are we trying to hide. If we knew they were squeaky clean maybe they would have been included in the study. I am against bias towards any country damaging the Mekong in any way.

 

[Puchaiyank]

The Mekong has been molested...it's water stolen...the river people left out to dry...

 

There is no calvary coming to the rescue!

[robblok]

2 hours ago, canopy said:

When you restrict your "study" to dig up dirt on China and ignore what other countries like Laos are doing to the Mekong it questions whether the results are fair and unbiased.

 

Agreed its not like the US has no agenda. The time that i believed the US blindly is long gone. They lost loads of trust and now with the president they have its at an all time low.

 

Not that i trust China more but both sides got something to gain from this so i doubt that either rapport is without bias. 

[PatOngo]

7 minutes ago, hotchilli said:

Unless USA owns the Spratlys they won't be taking back anything from anyone or giving it to someone else.

If someone has documented evidence they are the owner let them go get it!

But the United States, which has been challenging China's growing influence in Southeast Asia,

 

So, The United States is not really challenging China's growth at all? Right? Or are they just capitulating?

[GalaxyMan]

5 hours ago, PatOngo said:

Somewhere, someone needs to get wise to the BS sprouted by Beijing! Their aggressive expansionist policy is gathering momentum by the day!

There's a really great book about China's policy called The Hundred-Year Marathon - China's Secret Strategy To Replace America As The Global Superpower by Michael Pillsbury. The main thing I took away from the book is that if China says anything, assume it to be a lie. They do nothing that isn't self-serving.

The Hundred-Year Marathon - China's Secret Strategy To Replace America As The Global Superpower - Pillsbury, Michael.azw3 The Hundred-Year Marathon - China's Secret Strategy To Replace America As The Global Superpower - Pillsbury, Michael.epub The Hundred-Year Marathon - China's Secret Strategy To Replace America As The Global Superpower - Pillsbury, Michael.pdf

[BobbyL]

This is what will happen when you get into bed with them, and Thailand well and truly has. The overlords are slowly taking over. 

[KhaoNiaw]

5 minutes ago, GalaxyMan said:

There's a really great book about China's policy called The Hundred-Year Marathon - China's Secret Strategy To Replace America As The Global Superpower by Michael Pillsbury. The main thing I took away from the book is that if China says anything, assume it to be a lie. They do nothing that isn't self-serving.

The Hundred-Year Marathon - China's Secret Strategy To Replace America As The Global Superpower - Pillsbury, Michael.azw3 706.36 kB · 1 download The Hundred-Year Marathon - China's Secret Strategy To Replace America As The Global Superpower - Pillsbury, Michael.epub 426.13 kB · 0 downloads The Hundred-Year Marathon - China's Secret Strategy To Replace America As The Global Superpower - Pillsbury, Michael.pdf 2.51 MB · 1 download

And that's different from other countries how? Not saying give them a free pass but if that's the biggest take away from the book it's hardly mind-blowing is it? How much would you trust anything that comes out of the US? 

[AsiaCheese]

2 hours ago, PatOngo said:

I'm sure Laos doesn't aspire to dominate the world!

No, we have Murica for that already. And Pompeo as a reliable source of - uhm - facts.

[AussieBob18]

So good to see more of these 'anti-China' stories in the media - in Australia this is also happenning much more than it  previously did - ever since the 80s when negative stories seemed to 'disappear'.   

 

But he real 'story' is this - they are truths.  The media is finally 'turning' and is telling stories about China based on truths - embellished and exxagerated yes - but in essence they are the truth.

 

As George Washington said:  "Truth will ultimately prevail where there is pains to bring it to light."

 

Bring on the Covid19 pain - if it will reveal the truth about China to the world, then the more the better.