Table of Contents
- 1 What are the issues caused by hydropower dams along the Mekong River?
- 2 What effect could building a dam along the Mekong River in Southeast Asia have on different groups who live along the river?
- 3 How polluted is the Mekong River?
- 4 How does the Mekong River affect people’s daily lives?
- 5 When did the Mekong River problem start?
- 6 How many hydropower dams have been built along the Mekong River?
- 7 How are hydroelectric dams bad for the environment?
- 8 How are China’s mega dams affecting the environment?
What are the issues caused by hydropower dams along the Mekong River?
Hydropower dams have had a dramatic effect on the Mekong river over the last two decades, resulting in unseasonable flooding and droughts, low water levels in the dry season, and drops in the amounts of sediment carried by the river, with drastic consequences for biodiversity and fisheries.
What effect could building a dam along the Mekong River in Southeast Asia have on different groups who live along the river?
Dams disrupt the migration of fish, preventing them from reaching their spawning grounds upstream and hampering their natural life cycles. This, in turn, could significantly affect fish production in the Mekong, home to the world’s largest inland fishery.
What is wrong with the Mekong River?
The Mekong River ecosystem is on the verge of irreversible collapse due to the accumulative effects of climate change and increased numbers of upstream dams as well as other human-made activities such as deforestation, sand mining, extensive irrigation for agriculture and wetland conversion.
Why is the Mekong River Drying Up?
While drought ravaged the lower Mekong Basin in 2019, there was above-average rainfall and snowmelt in China and the flow from these events was nearly all retained in China’s dams. China’s actions have been a cause of droughts over a number of years. China is impounding more water than ever before.
How polluted is the Mekong River?
The Mekong is one of the most polluted rivers in the world, transporting an estimated 40 thousand tonnes of plastic into the world’s oceans each year. Understanding how plastic flows along the Mekong into the ocean is key to reducing its impact.
How does the Mekong River affect people’s daily lives?
Water from the Mekong River sustains a rich array of wildlife. Its fisheries provide a livelihood for 60 million people. As a source of water and food, it touches the lives of more than 300 million people from over 100 ethnic groups.
Who does the Mekong River affect?
The Mekong River connects China, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam physically and economically. The river is a lifeline for the entire basin, sustaining economies and livelihoods across the entire region.
Why is the Mekong River at Risk?
Two main risks include the obstruction of the estimated 600 migratory fish species that swim to their spawning ground and the trapping of sediment by dams upstream that prohibits the replenishment of the delta’s nutrients.
When did the Mekong River problem start?
It started when critical monsoon rains failed to arrive as usual in late May. As drought gripped the region, water levels in the Mekong dropped to their lowest in 100 years.
How many hydropower dams have been built along the Mekong River?
11 hydropower dams
China has constructed 11 hydropower dams, of which two are large storage dams, along the mainstream in the Upper Mekong Basin. Another 11 dams, each with production capacity of over 100 MW, are being planned or constructed. The total production capacity is estimated at 31,605 MW, increasing from 21,310 MW.
How do dams affect drought?
Hydropower dams cause unnatural river drought and flood-like conditions because they often divert water around entire sections of rivers, making them dry or worse (Richter et al., 2003).
Are there any dams on the Mekong River?
China completed its first mainstream hydropower dam on the Mekong, the Manwan dam in Yunnan province, in 1995, and has since planned and built 10 more. Eleven hydropower dams are in various stages of planning and construction in Laos and Cambodia on the mainstream of the Mekong river, along with hundreds of dams on its tributaries.
How are hydroelectric dams bad for the environment?
Hydroelectric dams damage native river ecosystems by changing the physical, chemical, and biological properties of the river and are therefore not a good solution to our energy crisis. Open, free-flowing rivers are used all over the world by migratory fish coming from the ocean to spawn in freshwater streams and rivers.
How are China’s mega dams affecting the environment?
These assertions are largely untrue. Instead, China’s mega-dams block the flow of rivers, increase the chances of earthquakes, destroy precious environments and shatter the lives of millions of people.
How are wild salmon affected by hydroelectric dams?
These rivers can be virtually useless to the migrating fish, because they can’t reach their spawning grounds. Out of all of the rivers in the United States that are over 600 miles long, only the Yellowstone River is still free flowing. Wild New York Salmon have virtually become extinct because of hydroelectric dams.