Conflict over dam.
Last week, Russian media reported that Tajikistan diplomats in Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, begun a fundraising to purchase shares of the Rogunskaja hydropower plant. This information represents and focuses on the most important political, economic, energy, environmental and social problems of Central Asia countries, as well as partly of Russia.
The Rogunskaja hydropower plant, built on the Vakhsh River, is one of the biggest and most controversial hydroelectric projects in the world. The dam, built as a stone embankment of 335 metres height, will be 150 meters higher than the famous Chinese Three Gorges Dam, even if the process of designing of the power plant (3600 MW) and its average yield (13.1 billion kWh), will be five times smaller than the Chinese giant.
The Dam represents a powerful container of water (with an area of about 13 km ²), which will be used not only for energy purposes, but also for water irrigation objectives. The construction costs are about $ 2.2 billion, and, according to other estimates, it may reach 3 billion USD (the Chinese Three Gorges Dam is expected to cost $ 30 billion). The construction was already started in 1976, but then suspended after the collapse of the Soviet Union. In 1993 an already constructed part of the dam was destroyed by the flood, which flowed the 45-meter embankment and gradually rinsed it.
The project has provoked so many emotions from the very beginning, hidden during the Soviet Union period. The criticism about this idea concerns the risk associated with the high level of seismology of the site, its vulnerability to landslides and the snow-stone avalanches possibilities. In 1911, after an earthquake in another part of Tajikistan, a natural and huge dam was created and the big lake Sarez arised. The lake accumulated for nearly 100 years a giant amount of water which now, in the event of a major earthquake or of the collapse of the slopes surrounding mountains, could lead to a catastrophe which may threatens the whole Central Asia. Additionally, critics of the projects have also noted that at the base of the dam there a tectonic trench.
Nowadays, Uzbekistan is against the project, mainly because of the expected concentration of water from the summits and slopes of the Pamir and Alajski Mountains. The Vakhsh River waters meet the Panj River situated close to the Tajik-Afghan, and they generate the Amu Darya, the major river of Uzbekistan and one of the most important rivers of Central Asia, which flows into the Aral Sea.
On the Tajik section of the Vakhsh River a chain of nine artificial lakes barrage has been already created. This system produces 90% of the hydropower electricity of Tajikistan, whose annual production is around 17 billion kWh, even if, according to specialists, the installed capacity can double this level. However, it is not enough to ensure the energy security of such a poor, weakly industrialized and not prosperous enough in natural resources country like Tajikistan, a mountain state that has the ambition to become an energy exporter, and perhaps to strengthen his political position towards its neighbours by controlling the water valves.
After so many years of attempts to solve the problem of the construction completion, in 2004 the government in Dushanbe has signed a contract with the Russian company "Rusal", which has financed the development of the technical-economic justifications of the project and the implementation of the repairing-building works. This caused a considerable cooling of relations between Uzbekistan and Russia in the economic as well as a political convergence between Tashkent and Washington.
However, because of non resolved controversies with Rusal, in 2007, Tajikistan renounced from the agreement. Officially, Rusal opposed to the continuation of the project because of economic (like the lack of credit guarantees from Western banks for risky projects) and technical reasons (lack of consent of Dushanbe on a compromise solution for Uzbekistan, which foresees the construction of irrigation reservoirs, providing water for agricultural purposes for its neighbors), and informally it was said it had took into consideration the technical expertise of the project made by a German company, "Lahmeyer International," and suggested other parameters of height and type of the dam. Perhaps, it has also been surrendered to the Kremlin's policy suggestions. The Rusal's decision led to a political conflict between Russia and Tajikistan.
The construction of the dam was resumed in 2008 by using own resources, and this decision led to unofficial criticism by EU institutions. After some discussions, the European Parliament sent a clear message to Dushanbe. If the authorities of Tajikistan will continue to build using their own resources, the EU will reduce the amount of humanitarian aid. As a consequence, in the second half of 2009 (the dam was supposed to be completed within December, 2009), there was a lack of funds for the project...
Meanwhile, Russia, taking care of its position in the region, resigned from participating in the construction of hydropower plants in Central Asia, "until the neighbouring countries won't give the official permission" as President Dmitry Medvedev said during his visit to Tashkent in January 2009. This represented a clear Russian response to Uzbekistan, whose regional and global role increases according to the establishment of a northern corridor for supply procurement for coalition forces in Afghanistan. This decision not only regarded the Rogunskaja project, but also other three hydropower plants located in the interior rivers of Tajikistan, including Sangtudinska Power Water-2, also situated on the Vakhsh River. It is worth noting that the construction of Sangtudinska EW-1 has been completed recently with the participation of Russia and Iran; Sangtudinska EW-2 will be built by Iran, consequently becoming a property of the Iranian state. After putting SEW-1 for use, Uzbekistan left the United Energy System of Central Asia, and accused Tajikistan of not respecting agreements concerning energy supplies (but in reality linked to the quantity).
Taking into considerations the growing international difficulties and the lack of funding, the Tajikistan President, Emomali Rachmon, asked citizens to buy shares of the Rogunskaja Hydropower Plant, in order to obtain $ 600 million out of the minimum of 800 million needed for the installation of the first power units. Media stated that the Tajik president forced each family to buy shares for the amount of $ 700 (the average salary in Tajikistan is 60 U.S. dollars). A national campaign was launched for the sale of shares, giving to it the highest priority. Diplomats in Tashkent gave the example to their compatriots, as well as they made a significant gesture towards their country, Uzbekistan. Indeed, authorities in that country continue to protest against the construction of the dam.
Tajikistan, after the launching of the run power plants, will not become a country flowing with milk and honey, but maybe will be able to sell part of its electricity especially to Kyrgyzstan and Afghanistan. Here, it collides with the competition from Uzbekistan. It will also be provided of a huge mass of fresh, clean water, which is nowadays missing for agriculture purposes and for the Aral Sea reservoir . It will become a very more important player in the Central Asian chessboard.
Władysław Sokołowski
The future of nuclear energy in Germany
After a short break in the political debates regarding the new tax code, the situation of public finances, as well as the mission in Afghanistan on the front pages of the German newspapers comes back the question of the future of nuclear energy.
As early as in January, Ronald Pofalla, Minister in the Office of the Chancellor, is to meet with representatives of the four operators of nuclear power plants: EON, RWE, Vattenfall, EnBW. It is a signal that after a few political gambits something is starting actually happen in this matter. Perhaps the problem has become a priority of "the head" of the government.
The agreement of the current Christian Democratic CDU / CSU and liberal FDP coalition government defines the use of nuclear power plants to supply energy in Germany as a bridging technology in the transition to the majority use of clean and renewable energy sources. In 2007, according to the German Energy Agency (DENA) the share of nuclear power plants in the electricity production was 22% while renewable sources provided 14%. Germany plans by the year 2019 that the energy derived from renewable sources will be 19% of supply. In 2050 Germany will reach full energy independence, based on renewable technologies.
Currently Germany has the atomic amendment to the Law from 2002, which is a record of the achievements of "red-green" government of Gerhard Schroeder in the mid-2000 when it succeeded in negotiating with energy corporations the "exit plan" from using nuclear energy. During the implementation of this ambitious project which is rooted in the ideology of the Greens, it was decided to apply the rule of the quota amount of energy to produce after 01/01/2000 (2.62 million GW - Federal Office for Radiation Protective reported that until the end of 2008 it was already used 1.24 million GW) The amendment didn't content a specific deadline. It is expected that the latest in 2022 the statutory maximum amount of time will elapse the last operation of the reactor (which for each is 32 years, when, for example in the Netherlands: 50). The owners of power plants may, however, freely dispose of this quota, before closing the older and less efficient power plants, so the actual date of withdrawal depends on corporations.
The majority of the actors of the energy market expected that the new government will meet very soon with the representatives of the owners of the 17 power plants and determine the conditions for renewal of their work, because just in this point is a unique coalition compliance of programs, which can not be said of other key topics. One of the conditions of the proposed extension is to provide half of the profits from further activity counted in billions of Euros in research and improvements of renewable energy technologies. On behalf of the government the case had to be addressed jointly by Norbert Röttgen, Environment Minister (CDU) and Rainer Brüderle, Minister of Economy (FDP). The last one wanted to settle the matter quickly in order to prepare projects and grants to support development of renewable energies. But the Minister for the Environment has estimated that until October 2010 he will develop a comprehensive idea of the energy strategy for Germany and there won t be earlier single declarations. Certainly he had in mind the good of the party in the forthcoming elections in the Land of North Rhine-Wesfallia. At the ministerial level, there was no intention of a better cooperation.
In an interview for Bild Zeitung, a few days before the December conference COP15 in Copenhagen, at the question whether the politicians will "tinker" with the law of the Schroder government, Minister Röttgen replied: "No, you can use nuclear energy in the long term only if the majority of people approves it". These words surprised a lot of people.
In the raised polemic, economic experts of its parent party, headed by a deputy and spokesman for economic affairs, Joachim Pfeiffer (known to the participants of the 4th Energy Forum in Budapest in 2009) and Hans Peter Friedrich (twin CSU) opposed, considering that this technology is currently the cheapest and therefore it must come to a labor renewal of nuclear power plants. The differences in vision shows the lack of unity of thought within the party and the gaps in the leadership role of Mrs. Chancellor, subject to recent criticism directed by her address. The economic daily Handelsblatt, citing Secretary-General of the CDU Hermann Gröhe interpreted it as an attempt to recruit new voters. CDU promotes the Environment Minister as a person with "green" views.
The chair of the Green Party faction Renate Künast - once co-founder of the amendment of the Law of 2002, which is now the opposition - in an interview with the "Leipziger Volkszeitung" does not believe in the attitude of the minister, and compares it to "the bad disguised wolf who is on the back-out for the Little Red Riding Hood."
Similarly speak the experts of civil movements opposed to nuclear power, accusing the government of a double play. In autumn, they plan protests and blocking of transport of radioactive waste in underground storage sites in Gorleben, Lower Saxony.
In the opinion of independent experts, the problem requires urgent solution. They fear that it won't be a fast start of talks, on which EnBW depends notably, as one of the reactors in Neckarwestheim in Swabia was finishing up his quota. Stephen Kohler with DENA, believes that the lack of negotiations will result in a chaos in the investment field, a lack of playing rules and development in the renewable energy sector, which may have a bad impact on the implementation of the objectives pursued the transformation of the energy mix.
In the remarks of Minister Röttgen for the "Bild Zeitung" is still one important element: the social acceptance of nuclear energy. Power generation by this technology is relatively cheap and does not cause greenhouse gas CO2. However, it is burdened by one major risk: disruption, disasters (eg. Chernobyl) diseases (leukemia), storage of waste material or terrorist threat. Although the German power plants are among the safest in the world, from time to time forced breaks happen. Since the 70s, it has been discussed and protested against the waste storages in Asse, Morsleben and Gorleben. The mentioned sarcophagus in Asse threatens to collapse and needs general repair. All of this means that nuclear energy has a low support in German society and raises sharp protests, and thus is treated by politicians with caution.
Piotr Mączka
