Showing 1 - 10 of 32
Hydro rebound will curb fossil fuels
News, Published on 11/07/2024
» Global hydroelectric generation slumped to a five-year low last year as a result of lower-than-average rainfall across China, North America and India, contributing to record fossil fuel combustion and emissions in 2023.
Missed energy transition opportunity
Oped, Rapeepat Ingkasit, Published on 22/06/2024
» I recently reviewed the draft Power Development Plan (PDP2024), outlining Thailand's power development roadmap from 2024 to 2037. This draft, which was put for a public hearing process during June 12–19, left me disappointed. The lower-than-expected economic growth, high energy surplus, fluctuating electricity costs due to gas price volatility and a more ambitious net-zero target all signal a need to recalibrate our plans towards low carbon emissions.
Energy shift calls for open markets, more renewables
Oped, Published on 03/04/2024
» The awaited new Power Development Plan (PDP) will be finalised by the second quarter of this year. The PDP -- which is scheduled to be implemented between 2024 and 2037, will focus more on renewable energy.
Can river meet all needs at same time?
Oped, Published on 17/11/2023
» Population and economic growth -- including the switch to electric vehicles and the rapidly expanding use of digital technology, leads to higher global electricity demand, which is expected to double by 2050, according to In McKinsey's report "The Global Energy Perspective 2021".
Waking up to a world water crisis
Oped, Published on 28/03/2023
» The world is becoming accustomed to the drip-drip of catastrophic headlines following each new climate-driven disaster. Increasingly frequent and severe heatwaves are causing wildfires in California and widespread coral die-offs in Australia. Unprecedented floods have wreaked havoc in Pakistan, Germany, China, and New Zealand. Drought in the Horn of Africa is causing famine for millions. And this list could go on.
Free-flowing Salween River needs protection
Oped, Pianporn Deetes, Published on 14/03/2023
» This morning at Sob Moei -- the confluence of the Moei and the Salween rivers on the Thailand-Myanmar border -- indigenous peoples and their supporters are attending a spiritual ceremony to express their collective stance to protect the Salween River from destructive dam projects.
A case of deluge deja vu
Oped, Editorial, Published on 17/09/2021
» The current flooding in the Central provinces brings back bad memories of the epic flood in 2011. In that annus horribilis, the central region was under water for months.
There's still hope for the Mekong
News, Published on 11/01/2021
» Until the onset of major dam construction in the higher elevations of the Mekong basin, its lower, broader reaches constituted the world's largest inland freshwater fishery and the mainstay for the employment, food security and nutrition for 60 or more million people. Tragically, over both of the last two May-October wet seasons, the mainstream experienced unprecedented low flows. In both years the normally reliable "flood pulse" was insufficient to meaningfully reverse the flow of Cambodia's Tonle Sap River to into its Great Lake, the "beating heart" of the fishery whose annual catch is directly proportional to its volume during the flood season.
Salween diversion project enters troubled waters
Oped, Pianporn Deetes, Published on 26/09/2020
» Over the past few months, the Irrigation Department and the House Committee Review of Integrated River Basin Management have been heavily promoting an inter-basin water diversion scheme. Planned projects will divert water across Thailand, incorporating international river basins, including the Mekong and Salween, to address "water shortages" in Thailand.
The Mekong doesn't need more destructive dams
Oped, Published on 05/06/2020
» On 11 May, the Mekong River Commission (MRC) announced that the proposed Sanakham hydropower project in Laos will undergo the MRC's Prior Consultation process. Sanakham is the sixth mainstream dam to be submitted for Prior Consultation.