Government officials have signed an agreement with a joint venture company to build a US$184 million dam in northern Laos that will send most of its generated electricity to neighboring Vietnam, a Ministry of Energy and Mines official told Radio Free Asia.
The hydropower project on the Nam Neun river in a mountainous area near the Vietnam border will generate 124 megawatts and is the latest dam planned for the impoverished, landlocked country, which has already built dozens with the aim of selling 20,000 megawatts of electricity to neighboring countries by 2030 and becoming the “battery of Southeast Asia.”
The dam will be built in an area that straddles Xiengkhouang and Houaphan provinces and is expected to be completed by 2027, according to the ministry official who requested anonymity to speak freely about a government matter.
The concession contract for the Nam Neun 1 Dam project was signed at a ceremony in Vientiane on June 19.
The project will be overseen by Vientiane-based Phongsubthavy Group Sole Co. Ltd., but a Vietnamese company will conduct the feasibility study and carry out the construction work, the ministry official said. The total cost is estimated to be.
Power generated by this dam will be exported to Vietnam through a 220 kilovolt transmission line, according to the agreement.
A preliminary study determined that some reserved forest will be cleared, and the reservoir behind the dam will flood other areas of reserved and protected forest, according to the ministry official.
Because the dam will be built in a remote area, no residents will have to relocate – a common source of complaints from Laotians on other hydropower projects.
The Nam Neun flows into a tributary of the Mekong River – the Nam Ngiep river – in Xiengkhouang province.
A Xiengkhouang province villager told RFA that the dam could still affect the lives of people downriver who depend on the river as a food source.
“Once the dam construction is completed, it will absolutely affect the environment and everything will not be the same,” he said. “The government and the relevant organizations and companies should conduct a feasibility study on its impacts to local people and the environment.”
Though the Lao government sees power generation as a way to boost the country’s economy, many of the projects have been controversial because of their environmental impact, displacement of people without adequate compensation and questionable financial and power demand arrangements.
Translated by Phouvong. Edited by Matt Reed.