Evaluating the greenness of hydroelectric projects of Northeast India: a study with special reference to the Tipaimukh p
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RESEARCH ARTICLE
Evaluating the greenness of hydroelectric projects of Northeast India: a study with special reference to the Tipaimukh project Nazrana Begam Choudhury . Soma Roy Dey Choudhury
Ó Indian Institute of Management Calcutta 2020
Abstract Urbanization, industrialization and human population explosion not only increased the global power demand, but also led to global warming, pollution and climate change. This encouraged production of power from renewable sources, and thus, hydropower development has been focused. Today, there is more than 1300 GW of installed hydropower across the world, and most of the hydroelectric projects (HEPs) are multi-purpose which includes irrigation, flood and drought mitigation and tourism. Although credited as cheap, clean and green, recent studies demonstrate that the reservoirs of HEPs produce enormous quantities of greenhouse gases (GHGs), including carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O). A large number of estimates on the amount of GHGs from HEPs are available from across the globe. India is next only to USA and China in terms of number of large dams, and thousands of new dams are being planned or constructed, especially in the northeastern part. However, none of these projects have been analyzed in terms of production of GHGs, which is an essential prerequisite for developing such projects and to determine whether carbon emission reduction credits can be accorded or not. The present study was conducted to determine greenness of some of the HEPs of Northeast N. B. Choudhury (&) S. R. Dey Choudhury Department of Commerce, Assam University, Silchar, Assam 788011, India e-mail: [email protected]
India in terms of emission of GHGs, and eligibility of the projects for carbon emission reduction credits. Further, the emission of different GHGs through various processes from the Tipaimukh HEP (Manipur) was estimated. In view of the findings, we have provided recommendations, which may be helpful in decision-making process. Keywords Carbon dioxide Climate change Dam Greenhouse gas Methane Nitrous oxide
Introduction In the era of urbanization and industrialization, accompanied by rapid increase in human population, there has been an increasing demand for power. Per capita energy consumption has increased between 2008 and 2018 by 5.26%. Between 2017 and 2018, the world consumption of energy grew by 2.9%, which is the fastest growth since 2010, and double the average growth of last 10 years. In accordance, the production of electricity increased by 3.7% between 2017 and 2018, which is one of the strongest growths since last 20 years, and was largely contributed by China, India and USA (BP Statistical Review of World Energy 2019). As a consequence, emission of CO2 increased by 2.0% between 2017 and 2018, which is the fastest since last 7 years, and the total emission of CO2 due to
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Decision
burning of fossil fuel in 2018 is estimated to be 33,890.8 million tonnes (BP Statistical Review of World Energy 2019). Consequently, the global tempe
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