Andy Turner's River Basins Processes and Management Research Cluster Meeting 2006-05-11 Page

Andy Turner's River Basins Processes and Management Research Cluster Page

River Basins Processes and Management Research Cluster Home Page

Avijit Gupta talk on The Mekong River - A future with limited data

• Great presentation! Thanks Avi!
• Mekong is huge crosses political boundaries. Rock cut for 1000s of kilometers
• Floods move the lower course of the river a lot. These are seasonal events and the river has very different discharge in low and high flow. Seasonility is greatest in the lower course
• Sediment locked in the channel in the upper part of the river
• River used for power, water, transport increasingly also for enviornmental/ecological farming type uses
• Most important use of the river is navigation now in the upper river Thailand - China
• Plans for lots of dams in the mountains. Some built some not... Cascade is to be finished by 2020 as it sounds like a good year! Some dams are closed/full. Is this good or bad? The cut off of sediment will surely effect the coast...
• The effect of Dams will be erosion of sediment deposited on bedrock especially in the rock cut channels initially...
• Amount of sediment coming out of the Mekong is estimated (by The Mekong river commission) at 150-170 Million tonnes per year... . How do they do that?
• Dams are likely to have a major impact on a major river. There are many scarey physical and ecological scenarios that can be articulated!
  • Catfish (important food source) and fresh water dolphins seriously effected?
• Geomorphology if the upper river is very interesting. It is techtonic and uplift driven nothing really to do with glaciation...
• Inner channel can be remotely sensed in the dry season. There is some sonar work done from boats. The inner channel is straight like the river itself...
• Any river diseases likely to be effected?
• Links to information about the Mekong River Commission
  • http://www.mrcmekong.org
  • http://www.eco-web.com/register/02769.html
  • http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mekong_River_Commission