ICOLD members - Yugoslavia

COMMENTS ON WCD REPORT

Yugoslav National Committee on Large Dams

YUCOLD

1.

WCD Report is quite a considerable effort in outlining the overall impact that building of dams and creating of reservoirs has made on the human environment. In this respect it shall be of significant interest to all concerned with dam problems.

The basic principles on which this analysis relies are not questionable:

• sustainable development
• demand-side management and improving of system management
• natural environmental effects and social consequences
• risk and benefit analysis, following equity principles
• participatory decision making

It is of interest to note that such principles are also outlined in ICOLD Position Paper on Dams and Environment.

2.

The cause of concern and disagreement with the WCD findings are the handling of data on the existing dams and the conclusions they reached.

3.

After a rather non-committal statement that dams represent significant contributions to human development, conclusions is formulated that in too many cases an unacceptable price is paid for the development achieved.

Such conclusion is meaningful only if accompanied by demonstrated possibilities of alternatives. And the alternatives in this case have to be related mainly to energy and water supply (for irrigation, industry and general use of population).

4.

The alternative energy sources forwarded by WCD to replace future hydropower (which now covers about 20% of energy production) are rather weekly supported possibilities of solar, wind and geothermal alternatives. Such sources are at present very far from being able to cover any significant part of the global power demand.

5.

On the other hand, the basic and governing fact that sustainable water supply of the existing size virtually cannot be achieved without storages and reservoirs, is not stressed and properly taken in consideration in WCD Report. Dams and storages are practically the only viable answer to existing needs and especially for the increment of world population, expected by the middle of the current century.

Better utilization of existing reservoirs (demand-side management, management of systems, appropriate maintenance) which are stressed by the Report are commendable advices, but cannot solve the water crisis which is foreseen to advance on us.

6.

On the other hand, the size of the sample treated by WCD Report (less than 0,3% of existing dams) and the question how representative the selected dams are, make the validity of the performed analysis questionable.

7.

The problem of people adversely affected by dams is stressed in the Report and a very elaborate Scheme is forwarded to improve participatory decision making, which is a correct trend. But the decision making should be balanced by considering the number of people favorably affected by dam construction, (which, once again, is without alternative when sustainable water supply is considered). Reviews demonstrate that the number of favorably affected people is very much greater.

8.

Concluding, we consider that the findings and recommendations are not correctly balanced considering adverse effects and benefits due to dam construction and cannot be accepted as unquestionable Guidelines. The storage of water is an unavoidable feature of any effective water resources management and dams have to be considered an unavoidable part of the system, which cannot be eliminated by any voluntary effort.