Electricity production
Hydropower dams
New Report Pleads for Accountablility on First Anniversary of Laos Dam Collapse
On the first anniversary Tuesday of Laos’ Xe Pian-Xe Namnoy (PNPC) dam disaster, a new report from two NGOs found that nobody has been held accountable for the catastrophe that caused what has been described as Laos’ worst flooding in decades. In Reckless Endangerment: Assessing Responsibility for ...
Survivors of Dam Collapse in Laos to Receive Half Compensation on Anniversary of Disaster
On the night of July 23, 2018, water poured over a saddle dam at the Xe Pian Xe Namnoy (PNPC) hydropower project in Champassak, Laos, sweeping away homes and causing severe flooding in up to 12 villages downstream in Champassak and neighboring Attapeu province. The disaster, ...
Civic groups call for reviews into Mekong River dam projects
Civic groups on Sunday lodged a petition calling for governments of countries along the Mekong River to review upcoming dam projects. The petition was on Sunday submitted to the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) by the Mekong Conservation Network in the North during a forum held in ...
Wassayos Ngamkham
Dam disaster on the way
It is now early on in the rainy season and the water volume on the Mekong River should have been high. But water levels on certain stretches of the international river, which runs from China through Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam, have reached their ...
Xayaboury dam on track to start commercial operation at year’s end
The Xayaboury hydropower plant yesterday began a trial operation of its fifth generator, setting the first run-of-river dam in the lower Mekong basin on track to begin commercial operation at the end of this year. A senior official at the Xayaboury Energy and Mines Department said ...
Ekaphone Phouthonesy
Nearly 500 Families to be Displaced This Month for Laos’ Fifth Mekong River Dam
A new Mekong river dam in Laos’ Luang Prabang province will displace up to 465 families this month, the latest in the continuing trend of hydropower projects forcing villagers to relocate all over the country. Residents of 10 villages in Luang Prabang’s Chomphet district must be ...
Eugene Whong
People’s network takes on China over Mekong
Local residents and environmentalists spent the weekend having a hot debate with the Chinese Embassy about Beijing’s utilisation and management of the Mekong River. While the embassy accused Thai media of spreading false information on China’s development projects in Southeast Asia’s longest rivers, the Thai Mekong ...
Govt sits idly by as China churns up the Mekong
Recently, a coalition of civil society groups, which has monitored development on and along the Mekong River, issued a frightening statement. Fluctuations of river flows during the past three decades have been at record highs, they said. That is a big deal for people whose livelihoods ...
Nauvarat Suksamran
Parliament approves power projects
The National Assembly yesterday unanimously approved plans by SPHP (Cambodia) to invest in a new hydroelectric dam in Pursat province, as well as plans by Schnei Tech to build solar farms in Pursat and Kampong Chhnang province. Since power cuts began in March across the country, ...
Ben Sokhean
Flood Warning as China Opens Floodgates on Mekong River Dams
Villagers living near the Mekong River in Chiang Rai Thailand and Laos are finding it difficult to cope with sudden releases of water from dams upstream in China. More than 200 families living in Laos’ Bokeo province have suffered because of sudden increases in the height ...
