Three Rivers Dams (16)
Poum Thmey, squeezed between a land concession and a flooding river (see here) will have to cope with the consequences of the possible construction of the Lower Srepok3 dam, just a few km upstream, where a barrier of rocks creates a series of rapids in the river. A feasability study was conducted by a Chinese state-owned company and engineers have been drilling the site to get soil samples which they left under the house they rented house in the village for 150$/month. The 300 megawatts dam should be 53 km high and 10 km long, flooding more than 750 km2 inside the Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary with a fairly obvious impact on the ecosystem there.
People in Phum Thmey know about the dam of course. A bunch of Chinese engineers don’t go unnoticed in a village… All they can do is wish the dam will not be built, protest with what they have and invoke the water spirit.
