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73 Comments
- joebaloney, on 04/22/2008, -0/+26Everyone will rave about how important this project is. Then 6 months after it begins, you will see nothing except stories about people being displaced because of the dam, or how workers building it are being exploited. Then when it is completed the stories will all be about how the energy is being sold off and profits pocketed by so and so and all the environmental damage being done.
Man, I just absolutely hate news. [closes browser] - Puppysquark, on 04/22/2008, -3/+25I hate to be a dick, but this will do several things.
1. The project may not help the Local African Population, causing them do go into debt.
2. It will destroy an untouched eco system, that if properly marketed would bring in tourism revenue.
3. Local farmers, who rely on the Congo each year to flood will not have this luxury. Causing even more of a food shortage and famine.
4. Look, The United States is not starting to remove dams, as they hurt the environment. Take the Grand Canyon for an example.
Finally, being a white water kayaker who has been to the region several times, they are going to screw up my playspot. - Emused, on 04/22/2008, -6/+22"Teach a man to fish...."
- rnwen2750, on 04/22/2008, -0/+10Yeah, since the Three Gorges project is going so well at the moment...
- dleesgeetar, on 04/22/2008, -0/+9dugg, would like to see more about the environmental impact as well
- louiebaur, on 04/22/2008, -2/+11Doubling the amount of electricity available on the continent sounds positive
- bosssmiley, on 04/22/2008, -1/+9...he'll rape the ecosystem in a generation."
Oh look, another African dam macro-engineering white elephant (see the Volta and Aswan dams for prior examples of colossal, egotistical 'yer doing it wrong').
And in the DR of Congo you say? That can only possibly end well... :-| - Morghin, on 04/22/2008, -0/+7IF they do this right, and the people at large can benefit from it as well, then this is a project that could seriously boost Congo's industrial and general growth. It would give jobs and electricity in huge amounts.
- inactive, on 04/22/2008, -1/+7WOw, you managed to get in your America sucks comment in a thread about Dams in Africa.
- diggSJaustin, on 04/22/2008, -0/+6That's a lotta dam money.
- lovestospooge, on 04/22/2008, -1/+6There really is no point in expanding grid infrastructure when there are no plants to provide the power.
- Kythas, on 04/22/2008, -2/+7FTA: "banks and private companies have found they can earn high returns from the emerging global carbon offset market and UN climate change credits."
This is what the global warming scam is really all about. - Yeyui, on 04/22/2008, -0/+5$1202.75 per person in the country
roughly 8 times their GDP - york2600, on 04/22/2008, -0/+4Floods aren't used to bring water. That would ruin the crops. They bring new soils every year. Think back to elementary school when they talked about Egypt. We get around this by using lots of fertilizers and imported soils but that's very costly and energy intensive. A poor person in Africa doesn't have the capital or energy resources to do this. Without flood waters their soil will quickly degrade.
- Stormwern, on 04/22/2008, -0/+4In the long run this will be a good thing, even for the environment. Hydro is the geenest reliable energy source out there, and it's infinitely renewable.
- stray, on 04/22/2008, -0/+4"Activists fear output will not help local people."
Whenever anything's going on in Africa, you can pretty much guarantee that it won't help the local people. - inactive, on 04/22/2008, -1/+5Is this the dam that will completely wipe out all archaological digs on the ancient Nubians? They are one of my favorite people in history.
http://islam-watch.org/HistoryOfJihad/Jihad-agains ...
The Nubians were skilful archers and attacked from a safe distance perched on tree tops. They were never seen by the Muslims who camped below. We have it on the strength of Muslim historian Balazuri that they would shout to the Muslims where would they like to be hit by their arrows, and where the Muslims mockingly named some part of the body, the arrow invariably struck there to the great grief of the Muslim who had mockingly challenged the Nubians to hit him. - inactive, on 04/22/2008, -0/+3They can't even maintain cars in that country. How are they going to maintain a hydroelectric damn?
I can see it 5 years after completion (if they ever complete it) when a $200 part breaks. Or all the copper wire is stolen. - inactive, on 04/22/2008, -1/+4Responding to each point:
1. Electricity will allow much-needed industry, jobs, and economic growth.
2. Yeah, I kinda agree. But the West really has no place telling other countries how to run their ecosystems.
3. How many first-world countries rely on flood plains versus irrigation? A dam means a large body of available water, plus the energy to pump it where it's needed.
4. Africa needs energy to grow. How much better would fossil fuels be for the environment? Not at all. And a little more stability may need to be in place before the Congo gets nuclear power. - endustry, on 04/22/2008, -0/+3Giant crocodile pond FTW.
- Mutton, on 04/22/2008, -0/+3What could possibly go wrong?
- ThinkFr33ly, on 04/22/2008, -0/+3Sigh... at $80 billion, this is DOUBLE the cost of building the equivalent number of Concentrated Solar Power plants. Northern Africa is a gold mine of solar power... and best of all, building CSP plants doesn't completely destroy ecosystems.
- TruckStuff, on 04/22/2008, -0/+2Africa already produces more electricity than it consumes. See http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/cabs/sadc.html as an example.
- locojones, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2You're absolutely right, what possible ecological impact could damming up the world's second largest river possibly have? Yes, we should think about comparing it to New York, which is the world's most ludicrous analogy, while completely dismissing the fact that this river hosts one of the world's most biodiverse ecosystems and flows through the world's second largest rainforest. What could possibly go wrong????
- Sinudeity, on 04/22/2008, -0/+2Finally. We can import our lectricity from Congo.
***** you Eskom! - novenator, on 04/22/2008, -0/+2try building a dam of this magnitude in a place like the Congo. Good luck.
- gametavern, on 04/22/2008, -3/+5Say goodbye to crops, and hello to bugs, disease and death. But at least there will be electricity.
- NanoStuff, on 04/22/2008, -1/+31. Make unsubstantiated claim.
2. Cry about displaced birds.
3. ???
4. Profit. - eric4ok, on 04/22/2008, -0/+2China's too far away. There's a limit to the distance that electrical power can be transmitted - it's called resistance. That's why people in Maine can't buy power from Mexico.
- ccL1, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1This could either be the best thing that can happen for Sub-Saharan Africa or something that fuel even more poverty and civil war. Here's the problem with development in that region: if the rich industrialized countries get no profit out of it, then they will not aid that region. This dam seems like something the rich countries could profit from. Spend 80 billion dollars on this damn, then the DRC would have to pay back in electricity exports and natural resource mining contracts. All the while, will it help the people of Congo? Only time will tell.
- Diganta, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1A few months ago an official Chinese government report stated that the environmental impacts of the dam was much greater than reported and previously estimated and the number of displaced people are no better off now. This is quite a big admission for them to make considering a lot of national pride went into this project.
- mgilbo1, on 04/23/2008, -0/+1Dams are what killed the lakes and rivers in the US, now they want to kill another untouched land? All dams need to be taken down and dismantled. Stop playing with nature boys, she bites back.
- vyasram, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1Dams FTW
- inactive, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1When the largest banks in the world get together and make decisions for us everybody wins....
FTA: "Britain hope to be able to offset their own greenhouse gas emissions against the renewable energy that dams such as Grand Inga would produce, and constructors are making windfall profits out of renewable energy projects in developing countries."
Once again Its amazing what you can build with imported slave labour! - ICSU, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1Smaller dams.
- TheSpook, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1> "It would give jobs and electricity in huge amounts."
The Congo could be the new Bangalore, once costs of living in India and China rise too high. - TheSpook, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1Curious - What sort of method of energy production would you recommend as an alternative? Nuclear?
- inactive, on 04/23/2008, -0/+1/facepalm
You're right, I forgot that was the reason. - ipugh, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1The problem with power in the DRC is the infrastructure, not the supply.
While I believe the dam to be a good start (they'll do it in phases, not just one $80bn project. More like 10 $8bn projects,) they need to focus on the infrastructure that currently has a capacity of something like 1% of DRC's 40M people. - blackinthmiddle, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1"shoffered"?
o_O - inactive, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1This will be a massive boondoggle (whatever that is)
- york2600, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1Northern Africa and Southern Europe
- S2000, on 04/22/2008, -1/+2If by greenest you mean ignoring the damage it can do in changing a whole ecosystem, sure.
- york2600, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1Microhydro. Lots of microhydro
- scantron27, on 04/22/2008, -1/+2god dam, thats a big dam
- XanKiran, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1Great! A rush to destroy a jungle ecosystem made profitable by carbon offset credits. Always count on Big Money to put good intentions to ill use.
- blackinthmiddle, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1Well they could always sell the excess electricity.
- blackinthmiddle, on 04/22/2008, -0/+1Well one thing's for certain. Having a huge money maker doesn't guarantee that the people will benefit. Nigeria is a perfect example. They're a huge oil exporter, yet the economy sucks and the reason is obvious. Unless you have a stable government, the only thing money makers do is line corrupt people's pockets.
But then again, if you attempt to "fix" a country's government, you're accused of meddling in another country's affairs. There's a long history of the U.S. doing this (Iraq being our current example) and the results are usually bad.
If environmental studies show that things won't be too bad, I say do it. Realize, however, that the locals won't benefit unless a stable government is in place. - MoroMou, on 04/25/2008, -0/+1Exploiting Africa... again.
- locojones, on 04/23/2008, -0/+1"If the do this right"???? Did you even read the article about how rife with corruption this area is? Here, let me quote you one salient passage:
""My village is 3km from Inga's power lines. They built a line almost 2,000km to the mines [in Katanga province] but in all of these years we have been left without electricity," said Simon Malanda, a community representative."
The people will be the last ones to benefit from this ecological disaster. -
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