17 Nov 2010
China, Burma, and Thailand have reportedly agreed to undertake a joint study on the feasibility of a 7GW hydropower project on the Salween River in Burma.
According to a report from industry website Hydro World, China's State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission issued a statement detailing how the $10bn project would be built on the Salween River in Myanmar over the next 15 years.
China Three Gorges Corporation, Sinohydro Corporation and China Southern Power Grid Corporation signed an agreement with the Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand and the International Group of Entrepreneurs in Burma to co-operate on the project last week.
The 1,740 mile Salween originates in Tibet and traverses China and Burma before reaching the Andaman Sea.
China is planning to add hydropower capacity in its southern provinces and to help build hydropower projects in neighbouring countries, including Burma, Laos and Cambodia, to improve expertise and meet demand from the region.
China's hydropower capacity is currently the world's highest at 200GW and it recently announced plans to boost this figure to 300GW by 2015 in its effort to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 40 to 45 per cent per unit of gross domestic product by 2020.
Also this week, Chinese firms began damming the middle reaches of the Brahmaputra river in Tibet to begin construction on a 510MW hydropower project.
The $1.2bn power station will have six 85MW generating units installed and will be operational by 2014.
The Indian government has raised concerns again this week about the possible downstream impact of this project after first discussing the subject in talks with China earlier this year.
Chinese officials have attempted to assure their Indian counterparts that the project would not divert water and would have little impact downstream.
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