TITLE:
Can Hydropower Drive Green Economy for Nepal: A Review
AUTHORS:
Ajay B. Mathema, Shailendra Guragain, Nawang C. Sherpa, Binay B. Adhikari
KEYWORDS:
Green Economy; Sustainable Development; Social Inclusion; Hydropower; Low Carbon; Biomass Energy; Royalty
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Environmental Protection,
Vol.4 No.7,
July
19,
2013
ABSTRACT: Economy is of importance for everyone
but the growing environmental destruction and disparity between the rich and
poor demands adoption of cleaner and better path so as to secure the future
resources and achieve sustainable development with better social inclusion. On
this regard, the term “green
economy” came into light.
The Asian Center for Environment Management and Sustainable Development (AEMS)
then explored the “green
economy” concept in Nepal
through a regional workshop on May 2012 with participants from Bangladesh,
Bhutan, India, Canada, UK and Nepal. Consequently, the hydropower sector of
Nepal was recognized as one of the most feasible and potential sector for green
economy. Therefore, various case studies of hydropower projects, interaction
programs and interviews with relevant personnel were carried out for this study
to analyze the scope of hydropower in achieving the three important attributes
of green economy, namely—resource
efficiency, low carbon and social inclusion. Nepal is rich in water resources;
it is therefore possible to use our abundant water resource in an efficient
manner. Likewise, the end product of hydropower is clean energy though carbon
emission is involved during the construction. It shows the potential to replace
considerable amount of carbon emission from biomass based energy resources.
Similarly, hydropower project exhibits positive implication on the local
society besides making electricity available to the whole nation. The locals
also get floating shares and royalty benefits to develop the project affected
area. However, the affected areas now have minimal share in royalty. Besides,
this study also addresses the issues of policy implication and challenges. All
the relevant issues of hydropower as studied reveal that there are required
provisions at place in Nepal for hydropower sector to fit perfectly in green
economy concept, if only, the prevalent issues are handled efficiently and
effectively by the relevant sectors.