FORUM (Spotlight Weekly)

Guidelines On Construction of Dams

By Dr. Janak Lal Karmacharya

In a meeting of international stakeholders convened by the World Bank and the World Conservation Union (IUCN) in Gland, Switzerland in April 1997, it was agreed to create an independent commission to review the performance of large dams and set guidelines for the future. The overreaching goals of the Commission were (I) to review the development effectiveness of dams and assess alternatives for water resources and energy development, and (II) to develop internationally accepted standards, guidelines and criteria for decision making in the planning, design, construction, monitoring operation and decommissioning of dams. The initial core resources for the Commission came from the WB and IUCN. There are 48 other contributors. The Commission consists of twelve Commissioners including a Chair, a Vice Chair and a full-time secretariat.

The commission has conducted case studies of ten focal dams river basins, crosscheck survey of 150 dams and carried out thematic reviews on Social issues, Environmental issues, Options assessment, Economic and Financial issues and Institutional and Governance issues.

The Forum Meeting

On April 7 and 8 this year, the Commission organized a Forum Meeting in Cape Town attended by about 60 forum members from all over the world, who were specifically selected and invited for this purpose. Various groups discussed all the above issues. Furthermore, the compliance and good practice promotion, need for a level playing field in options assessment management of existing dams and negotiating competing rights were also deliberated upon. Significant divergent opinions were recorded, which showed the need to do more exercise to come up with a balanced view, if the recommendations and guidelines are to be universally acceptable. In view of the wide divergence in the perceptions and opinions, it was agreed to explore the possibility of calling another forum meeting before that final report was issued, which otherwise was not planned. Industry group presented its separate recommendation for discussing and adoption.

The WCD meeting was important in that its guidelines and criteria for dam development will have far reaching consequences even if these are not going to be legally binding obligations. It could be, at least, taken as a reference book for good practices in dam construction and, therefore, will be viewed by stakeholders with seriousness.

The Report

The WCD Report "Dams and Development" was officially launched by the former president of South Africa, Mr. Nelson Mandela on November 6, 2000 in London. The report is now widely circulated and being scrutinized by concerned organizations, states and other stakeholders. The excitement during the launch was understandable as no draft report was circulated and strict secrecy was maintained about the report till its launch. Hence, the Report should be considered the work of eleven member commissions, of course, hopefully based on the extensive knowledge base collected by the WCD secretariat. However, the Report preparation was not an easy job, even if only eleven persons were involved as is evident from the inclusion of a comment by one of the commissioners. The guidelines are expected to add as the support instruments for masking decisions by government, international, multi-national and bilateral organizations, professional organizations, private sector and civil society at large.

The Guidelines

The guidelines has identified five key decision points (i) needs assessment validating the needs for water and energy services, (ii) selecting alternatives, identifying the preferred development plan from among the full range of options, (iii) project preparation verifying that agreements are in place before the tender of the construction contract, (iv) project implementation, confirming compliance before commissioning and (v) project operation, adopting to changing contexts.

The 26 guidelines are grouped into seven strategies. These are:

Priority 1: Gaining public acceptance which includes three elements of the guidelines: (i) stakeholders analysis (ii) Negotiated Decision-making process and (iii) free, prior and informed consent.

Priority (2) Comprehensive Options Assessment, which embraces eight elements of the guidelines. These are strategic impact assessment for environmental, social, health and cultural. Heritage issues: project level impact assessment for the above, multi-distributional analysis of projects, valuation of social and environment impacts, improving economic risk assessment.

Priority (3): Addressing existing dams includes two elements of the guidelines. These are ensuring operating rules, reflect social and environmental concerns and improving reservoir operations.

Priority (4): Sustaining rivers and livelihood includes three elements like baseline ecosystem surveys, environmental flow assessment and maintaining productive fisheries.

Priority (5): Recognizing entitlement and sharing benefits includes four elements like baseline social conditions, improvement risk analysis, implementation of mitigation, resettlement and development action plan and project benefits sharing mechanisms.

Priority (6): Ensuring compliance includes compliance plants, independent review panels for social and environmental matters, performance bonds, trust funds and integrity pacts.

Priority (7): Sharing for peace development and security will address the procedures for shared rivers.

Without going into the in-depth analysis, a quick look on the guidelines exposes the extensiveness of the same and its cumbersome nature during the implementation. One question that comes up is whether the same kind of extensive guidelines should be made applicable to other alternatives such as thermal/nuclear in power and ground water in irrigation.

Because of its far-reaching consequences for water resources development, an in-depth and critical analysis will be required before it is accepted as a guideline for dam development. While there should not be two opinions on the requirement of a guideline for disciplined development of such projects, there should also not be two opinions on the need for it being flexible for it to be universally acceptable. Development of a framework guideline could be the answer rather than a 50-page document.

(Excerpts of water resource expert Dr. Karmacharya's article published in WECS bulletin)