Opinion (Spotlight Weekly)

Multipurpose Langtang-Melamchi Project

By AB Thapa

Attention of concerned government departments and agencies, National Planning Commission, donors' community providing invaluable assistance to our country, and also various NGOs & INGOs associated with water resources development problems of Nepal should immediately be drawn to examine the possibility of developing the Langtang- Melamchi scheme as a multipurpose project. The proposed multipurpose project could avail us golden opportunity to provide electricity to Nepalese people at the cheapest rate and also water in abundant quantity to Kathmandu residents for free. Unfortunately we are now about to wreck such prospect to develop the Langtang-Melamchi multipurpose project. It would be quite unfortunate if we became the victim of our own ignorance despite the fact that the world community has been generously helping us to resolve various problems directly or through institutions like the ICIMOD or others. This matter needs to be urgently reexamined.

The Multipurpose Langtang-Melamchi Project would be linking the three rivers - Langtang, Melamchi and the Kulekhani. The proposed linkage would help to unfold the prospect for developing hydropower stations in a cascade with a total hydraulic head of over three kilometers that would allow to generate electricity at a cost perhaps the lowest in our region. This grandiose multipurpose project comprising of several virtually independent projects can be developed at several stages, as a result, the full implementation of the entire scheme could be spread over a long time. At present different government agencies are engaged in developing the Langtang and Melamchi rivers for the generation of electricity or supplying water to Kathmandu valley Each agency is doing its own way. They are not at all seen to be interested to explore the broader possibility of developing these rivers in a most cost-effective way as multipurpose projects. Despite the fact that in theory our national planners have never failed to drum up the importance to develop multipurpose projects, however, in practice it rarely dawns on our people involved in actual implementation that the country could be enormously benefited if various schemes identified to fulfill single objective would be developed as multipurpose projects.

The Opportunity

The hydropower generation potential of the Langtang river has turn out to be quite high because it is possible to provide a relatively large storage reservoir at a very high elevation in the upper reach of this river. The Langtang storage reservoir can be developed to provide all through the year an uniform flow of more than 15 cumecs in the middle and lower reaches. A total head of about 3500 meters could be utilized for power generation by 5 hydropower stations to be built in a cascade and out of them three power stations would be operating at an exceptionally high head of about 1000 meters or more. The uppermost would be the Langtang power station directly drawing water from the storage reservoir at Jaithang. The full supply level (FSL) of the storage reservoir is expected to be at 3995 meters. The lowermost would be the Kulekhani-3 power station that will have tailrace water level at 490 meters.

Some reservations have been expressed about the Langtang river discharge in the Melamchi office comments on the article published in the SPOTLIGHT some time ago. The Melamchi comments raise the doubts that the Langtang river discharge stated in the article is too high. It is tried here to briefly explain about the Langtang discharge The catchment area of the Langtang river at the storage dam site(Jaithang) is about 150 sq. kilometers, it is thus greater than the catchment area of the Melamchi river at its intake site ( 130 sq. km.). The adopted average annual discharge of the Melamchi for the feasibility study is 10.7 cumecs. However, the average annual discharge according to the SMEC is 15.7 cumecs. It would not be misplaced to adopt tentatively the average annual river discharge at the dam site to be 15 cumecs as long as the volume of the storage reservoir would be adequate to maintain the estimated regulated flow at least throughout the dry season. Any shortfall in water supply to the hydropower station in the wet months would not be harmful Let us see what the Civil Engineering Guidelines for Planning and Designing Hydroelectric Developments prepared by the ASCE of the USA has to say on this matter "Hydropower is most valuable if it can be produced when it is most needed. For example, a hydropower's output may be highly marketable if a substantial portion of its output is produced in the peak load months, even though little or no power is produced during the remainder of the year."

The next Langtang power station ( Langtang-2 ) would be drawing water at Ghore Tabela. The total catchment area of the Langtang river at Ghore Tabela is 250 sq. km. which is two times greater than the Melamchi catchment at intake. Thus it might not be wrong to presume that the average annual flow of the Langtang at Ghore Tabela could be about 20 cumecs.

High Head Power Plants

Of all the site characteristics, head is the most important. Design guidelines, 1989 approved by the American Society of Civil Engineers has given some simple reasoning that would help to explain why the super high head Langtang power stations operating at many times greater head by comparison with other hydropower plants could be built at very low cost. "Very simply if one doubles the head the quantity of water needed to produce a certain amount of energy is halved, Thus, for like site energy development the penstock area and reservoir volume are halved and further large cost reductions occur for powerhouse and machinery costs. This fundamental consideration is at the root of the large cost reductions that occur at higher heads."

A joint team of German, Japanese and US consultants has made an interesting reference to a Canadian high head project vis-‡-vis the Upper Arun project to be operated at a moderately high head that helps to explain why the planners seek after very high head hydropower plants "It is worth mentioning that the search of the worldwide inventory of the existing hydropower installations identified only one plant with a combined head and flow magnitudes greater than that of the Upper Arun - Kemano in British Columbia, Canada". At present the electricity generated by the 896 MW Kemano Project with a 16.3 km long headrace tunnel operating at 800 m head provides power for Alcan's aluminum smelters at Kitimat at a cost below US cents 3 per KWh.

Water Supply For Free

At present the Melamchi project plan is being revised. According to the revised plan the Melanchi project would be developed exclusively to supply water to Kathmandu valley at a total cost of about US $400 million. It is promised that this project could be commercially viable and the residents of the Kathmandu valley would be paying per month only Rs. 500, however, such water charge might be at least about US $ 400 per tap per year if simple logic of the argument is allowed to prevail in calculation to determine the water charge. It is very clear that the water authority would have to collect from the water users in the valley per annum about US $ 40 million to recover interest on loan including a portion of the investment. Will the water users who have already spent a great deal of money on developing their own infrastructures to draw groundwater would be really interested to buy water from the water supply authority in appreciable quantity if the water charge is too high? The water supply strategy document, 2000 provides sufficient indications that the water authority appears to be decided by hook or by crook to force the Kathmandu residents to buy Melamchi water. It is stated in the strategy document that the extractions from the shallow aquifers would also be licensed, metered and charged if the water users are found to be engaged perhaps even in small commercial activities that require use of water. What is the guarantee that the bulk of the Melamchi water supplied to Kathmandu valley would not be wasted? Is not the water authority going to land in a terrible mess which might not be too different from the one that has forced the NEA to bear mounting losses? At present the NEA is paying a huge amount of money each year to private hydropower developers for the purchase at full price of the secondary energy that is completely wasted. According to the World Bank financed Upper Karnali Feasibility study the secondary energy could be valued only at 10% of the firm energy based on the expected net value of such energy for the thermal fuel displacement. The NEA has silently shifted its losses onto the users of the electricity without any hesitation

There is also a talk about 50% subsidy to keep the water supply charge down. Perhaps it is yet to be examined by the policy makers how far the idea of such subsidy would be palatable at a time when there is already a big crisis in the agriculture sector because the government has very recently withdrawn the fertilizer subsidy provided to the poor farmers. The issue related to water charge needs to be carefully reexamined against the backdrop of the new possibility that the Melamchi water could be supplied to Kathmandu valley for free.

Analogy With Kankai Multipurpose Project

Several meetings held at the GTZ office in Frankfurt in 1970s were devotated to finalize the feasibility study report on the Kankai Multipurpose Project prepared by the famous German consulting organization the SALTZGITTER The consultants' report was excellently prepared. The draft feasibility report, which had been circulated well ahead of our arrival in the Germany, had been focused on presentation of a variant that entailed high cost as well as higher efficiency. After few sessions we were able to convince the German team that suitable choice of a poor country like Nepal would have to be the variant that requires lower investment despite the fact that the efficiency would also be low. Moreover the provision of the most modern infrastructure alone at a very high cost can not guarantee that our farmers accustomed to traditional way of farming would be able to come anywhere close to the productivity target set in the draft feasibility study report. Thus there was a danger that the whole project could turn into a white elephant if the feasibility study report is not substantially modified. We were very grateful to the German team that they agreed to accept our proposal. The entire feasibility study report had to be redrafted. The total project cost was brought down to about US $170 Million from its earlier cost estimated at about US $ 300 million. There was an interesting feature of the revised feasibility study report. The total irrigable area as well as the installed capacity of the hydropower station had remain unchanged despite the fact that there was drastic reduction in the total project cost, as a result, the consultants were unjustly accused of cheating. International donor agencies like the ADB were very concerned Very strong allegation seemed to have been made by the KFW which might have found itself very much humiliated because one of the German institutions was the culprit that had committed unethical work that hurt the pride of the German consulting firms. Finally everybody realized that the German consultants had done nothing wrong.

The Kankai Multipurpose Project episode might have great relevance to the planning of the Melamchi water supply project also. We can ask ourselves the question why not to adopt the same policy over here. The NEA could be placed in charge of the projects to interconnect the Langtang, Melamchi and Kulekhani rivers in two stages in the hope that the entire cost of the project would be recovered from the benefits accrued from the generation of the electricity and the NEA would supply initially up to two cumecs water to the residents of the Kathmandu valley for free. In the second stage when the Langtang storage dam at Jaithang would be operational and the Melamchi tunnel would be running in full, at that time water even up to four cumecs could be provided to the Kathmandu valley for free. The development approach outlined here implies that we would not have to resort in very near future to stringent measures to raise the efficiency by reducing the conveyance and distribution losses that would certainly involve a huge investment or increase in cost. Finally it means that our policy should be for the time being � Low Efficiency And Low Cost.