Online Travel Vietnam: Cat Tien National Park and Nam Cat Tien Protected Forest are under a huge threat posed by plans to build some hydropower plants around and inside the national park, let alone the adverse impacts caused by operational plants, a source said.
Tran Van Thanh, director of Cat Tien National Park, told the Daily on Tuesday that Duc Long Gia Lai Joint Stock Company is carrying out initial surveys for building Dong Nai 6 and Dong Nai 6A hydropower plants with a total capacity of 241MW.
Thanh said that if the two projects covering a total of 375 hectares are approved, some 135 hectares of forest land of the national park would be encroached on and 140 more hectares of the protected forest will be chopped down to make room for the hydropower plants.
"For the sake of forest preservation, we strongly object to the construction of these plants because they will negatively affect the environment and biodiversity of the national park," he said.
Apart from these two projects, Vietnam National Coal and Mineral Industries Group has been licensed to build Dong Nai 5 hydropower plant, only one kilometer from the national park upstream the Dong Nai River. Thanh said this 150MW hydropower plant, to be developed at a cost of VND5.2 trillion, is also a menace to the biological balance of the park.
Construction of Dong Nai 5 hydropower plant has not started as the project owner is still seeking bank loans for development.
"As I have learnt recently, the project owner wanted to borrow money from some foreign banks to carry out this project, but those banks have disapproved the project due to environmental concerns," said the director of the national park.
The projects to build Dong Nai 6 and Dong Nai 6A plants have now been included in a master plan for hydropower development in the Dong Nai River basin, said Hua Duc Nhi, deputy minister of Agriculture and Rural Development.
Nhi said in a document that was sent to the Government last week that the Ministry of Industry and Trade had supplemented these two projects into the master plan, and stressed that such developments would damage the environment.
It is unknown if these projects would be approved, Nhi said, adding the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment would look at environmental issues first.
"The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment is responsible for appraising the environmental impacts of these projects before the developers can receive investment certificates," Nhi told the Daily on Tuesday on the phone.
Thanh of the national park also showed concern over the long-term damage caused to the national park by operational hydropower plants, comprised of Dong Nai 4, Dong Nai 3 and Da Nhim. These hydropower plants located around 25 kilometers from the national park are using water from the Dong Nai River for their power generation.
In an effort to save the forest coverage, and the biodiversity of the park and the protected forest, Thanh has several times asked related ministries to hire an independent company to appraise the environmental impacts caused by these hydropower plants, but his petition has not been heeded.
Source: thesaigontimes
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