IN-DEPTH: CCP Uses Colossal Hydropower Dams to Control Mekong River and Southeast Asia

Part of the first rail line linking China to Laos, a key part of Beijing's 'Belt and Road' project across the Mekong, in Luang Prabang, Laos, on Feb. 8, 2020. Aidan Jones/AFP via Getty Images

A cluster of huge Chinese dams in the upper reaches of the Mekong exacerbated severe drought conditions in the river’s lower reaches this summer. Experts believe that over the past decades, the dams have become a de facto weapon of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP),  advancing its interests in Southeast Asia, while heavily damaging and threatening the region’s ecology and livelihoods.

The Mekong is about 2,900 miles long, with its headwaters in the Tibetan Plateau. Its upper reaches, winding 1,300 miles through southwest China, are known as the Lancang River. In addition to China, the Mekong flows through five countries in Southeast Asia: Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam. The giant river is a lifeline for millions of people.

“Climate indicators suggest there is a severe drought developing in the Mekong,” Brian Eyler, senior researcher, and director of the Southeast Asia Program at the Stimson Center, a U.S. think tank, said after a recent event in Washington.

China takes “water out of the river during the wet season and then puts it back during the dry season for hydropower production,” said Mr. Eyler, “That exacerbates the kind of drought conditions that are setting in now.”

Mr. Eyler co-leads the Mekong Dam Monitor (MDM). The project uses remote sensing, satellite imagery, and GIS analysis, together with social media, to inform vulnerable Mekong communities and governments about the impacts of upstream dams over the Mekong.

Holding Back Water, Exacerbating Drought

By storing water and then releasing it unnaturally, Chinese dams artificially alter the river’s water level. When the water level in the lower reaches fluctuates abnormally, it has long-term effects on fish migration, agriculture, and even transportation.

Chinese-German hydrologist Wang Weiluo, in an article published in Yibao China online journal in March 2021, voiced similar concerns. Moreover, according to Mr. Wang’s data, the situation may actually be more severe than the MDM indicates at present.

MDM monitors an 11-dam cascade on the Lancang River. Mr. Wang noted that by the end of 2020 that number was actually 12: it should include the Guoduo hydropower plant, which is located on the Zhaqu River in CCP-controlled Tibet. The Zhaqu is viewed as the source of the Lancang River. Eight more dams are either planned or under construction.

Farmer Phia Paokhammacham (L) and his son fish on the family drought-hit rice field near to Mekong River at Mai village near Vientiane, Laos, on March 27, 2010. Hong Dinh Nam/AFP via Getty Images

Another 85 dams are scattered over hundreds of branches of the Lancang River. Among them, the enormous Nuozhadu Dam in southwestern Yunnan Province has a total reservoir capacity of 23.703 billion cubic meters,  Mr. Wang said in the report.

An MDM analysis entitled “Mekong Dam Monitor at One Year: What Have We Learned?” states that the Nuozhadu Dam and the Xiaowan Dam combined hold more than 50 percent of the Mekong’s active storage. The two largest Chinese dams on the Mekong River, they are both owned by Huaneng Hydrolancang, a state enterprise.

Years of Debate

Almost fifteen years ago, in 2010, the Mekong River Commission member countries—Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, and Cambodia—appealed to Beijing over the decline in the Mekong River’s water level, saying that the dams on the Lancang River were causing drought conditions downstream.

In response, Beijing insisted that the average annual runoff at the mouth of the Lancang River accounts for only 13.5 percent of the Mekong’s estuary and that the dams have had “no effect” on the river’s lower reaches.

Experts and scholars questioned the official statement at the time.

In a 2010 article published by London-based environmental group China Dialogue Trust, Tsinghua University professor Qin Hui noted that most of the river sections at the exit of the Lancang River have a much larger outflow than 14 percent. As an example, he cited the Luang Prabang River section, where the flow of water accounts for an average of about two-thirds of the river’s volume.

Mr. Wang agreed, noting that the primary water source of the Lancang River is snow melt from mountains and groundwater in the territory of China, which provide plenty of water even in the dry season. The Mekong River mainly depends on water from the upper reaches (Lancang River) when there is no rainfall during the dry season.

In its natural state, the water flow from China to Chiang Sheng in Thailand has an average flow rate of 689 cubic meters per second during the dry season, which accounts for half or even two-thirds of the flow rate of the Mekong River in the dry season, Mr. Wang said.

Blocking Sediment Damages Ecological Environment

The Lancang River carries snow and soil from glaciers into the Mekong River. With nutrient-rich water and sediments deposited during the rainy season, the Mekong River Basin has become the world’s most significant inland fishing ground and rice granary.

However, Chinese-built hydroelectric dams have blocked much of that sediment, resulting in ecological degradation in the Mekong River and the Mekong Delta.

Increasing salinization in the Mekong Delta is directly affecting rice production in Thailand and Vietnam, both of which have high yields and exports of rice.

A bamboo fishing trap lies on the bank of the drought-hit Mekong River next to fishing boats at Thatkhao village, in the vicinity of Vientiane, Laos, on March 27, 2010. Hong Dinh Nam/AFP via Getty Images

Reuters reported in December 2022 that “in 2020, only about a third of those river-borne soils would reach the Vietnamese floodplains, and at the current rate of decline, less than five million tonnes of sediment will be reaching the delta each year by 2040.”

Capture fisheries, a vital source of food for Mekong riparian countries, are also facing challenges. For example, in Cambodia’s Tonle Sap Lake, the world’s fourth-largest inland fishery, hundreds of fish species that migrate from the lake to the upper reaches for spawning have been blocked, and some species are on the verge of extinction.

According to satellite data by Germany-based aquatic remote sensing company EOMAP, the average turbidity of the Nuozhadu Dam in 2012 was 98 percent lower than that at the same site before the dam was built in 2004.

Ignoring International Convention

To date, the Chinese government has yet to release any hydrological data on sedimentation in the upstream dams.

Chinese dams often restrict or release water without notice, causing harm to downstream countries. At various times, the CCP has agreed to inform the five downstream countries about activity in the upstream dams, but critics say it has been less than generous in doing so.

On Dec. 31, 2020, Jinghong Hydropower Station cut off water upstream for six days before notifying the downstream countries that water restrictions would be in place for 20 days. But at that time, the Mekong River water level had already dropped by more than 1 meter. 

“Jinghong’s sudden restrictions of water starting 12/31 caused a sudden 1-meter drop in river level 380 kilometers downstream at Chiang Saen on 1/3-4. LMC and MRC data confirm this, but as of 1/4, China provided no notification of the sudden and unusual change that will impact fish and farming processes downstream,” an MDM update said.

In 1995, the Mekong River riparian countries established the Mekong River Commission, But China, a critical upstream country, has refused to join.

U.S.-based China expert Shi Shan told The Epoch Times on Aug. 8 that the Chinese government is unlikely to join the Mekong River Commission and the ruling communist party has never recognized such a think tank and supervisory body.

“The CCP is not a signatory to almost any international or UN river law, such as the International Water Law, because it [CCP] believes that all such water laws impose restrictions upstream and is reluctant to be regulated from doing whatever it wants.” Mr. Shi said.

A Political Bargaining Chip

Mr. Wang warned that dams have become a strategic weapon allowing the CCP to control Southeast Asia. For the communist regime, control of the upstream dams is a substantial political bargaining chip, allowing China to influence southeastern Asian countries.

In March 2016, the Mekong River’s water volume decreased; Vietnam’s rice farms were in severe drought, and seawater poured back. Beijing took the unprecedented step of releasing water “for emergency use” by downstream countries, The Diplomat reported. Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Lu Tang said in a press conference, “It goes without saying that friends should help each other when help is needed.”

(L to R) Thai Prime Minster Prayuth Chan-O-Cha, Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc, Chinese Prime Minster Li Keqiang, Cambodian Prime Minster Hun Sen, Laos' Prime Minster Thongloun Sisoulith, and Myanmar Vice President Mint Swe link arms during the second Mekong-Lancang Cooperation leaders' meeting at the Peace Palace in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, on Jan. 10, 2018. Tang Chhin Sothy / AFP via Getty Images

Beijing’s help was proved to have ulterior motives. A week later, the first meeting of the leaders of the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation, chaired by China’s then-Premier Li Keqiang, was held in Sanya, on southern China’s tropical Hainan island.

Having received “emergency” water from the CCP, the five “thirsty” southeastern countries downstream signed the Lancang-Mekong agreement, to “build a community of shared future of peace and prosperity among Lancang-Mekong countries,” according to an official statement.

The Lancang-Mekong Cooperation is part of the CCP’s “Belt and Road” initiative, which uses investments, loans, and infrastructure to expand China’s influence in Southeast Asia.

Mr. Shi said that since the start of the CCP-led Mekong-Lancang Cooperation, the CCP has gone on the offense in Southeast Asia, providing obedient countries with funding, investment, and more information about the impoundment and release of water from upstream dams, but holding it back from those that are not compliant.

“This political leverage has obviously affected some Southeast Asian countries,” Mr. Shi said.

Ream Naval Base: A Foothold in Cambodia

A prominent example of this coercive tactic, according to Mr. Shi, is Cambodia’s welcome of a CCP-built military harbor facility in its territory.

Between 2010 and 2017, Ream Naval Base, near the South China Sea and the Strait of Malacca, was the site of joint training and naval exercises between Cambodia and the U.S. military.

However, in 2017, Cambodia suspended Angkor Sentinel, the annual joint exercise between the U.S. Army and the Royal Cambodian Army.

In 2019, the U.S. Defense Department asked Cambodia to explain why it suddenly turned down a U.S. offer to repair a naval base, raising suspicion that Cambodia had plans to host China’s military.

The same year, The Wall Street Journal revealed that China and Cambodia had signed a secret agreement allowing CCP forces to use Ream Naval Base for 30 years.

Chinese-funded redevelopment of Ream Naval Base included dredging of the harbor to allow larger military vessels to dock there. In July 2023, geospatial intelligence provider BlackSky released imagery showing the nearly completed base.

“The speed of development at the Ream base makes it difficult to deny the intentional velocity behind China’s overseas basing initiatives,” said Craig Singleton, China Program deputy director at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, in a BlackSky press release. Mr. Singleton noted that the harbor was big enough to support the new 300-meter-long Type 003 Fujian aircraft carrier.

“Unfortunately, the harbor will probably be an essential sea route for the CCP to gain a foothold in the South China Sea and even to allow the CCP military to cover and connect the Pacific and Indian Oceans.” Mr. Shi told The Epoch Times.