Ministry of Environment decides to push for state-led dam construction again… Experts: “Return to the past”

The Ministry of Environment declared that it would change the flood control paradigm (system) by focusing on tributary and stream maintenance, including dam construction and dredging, to respond to extreme flooding that has become routine due to climate change. In some cases, environmental impact assessments were decided to be omitted so that maintenance projects could be started in a timely manner, raising concerns about environmental damage. There was criticism among experts that “this is a return to the past flood control paradigm, which was concluded to have limitations in responding to climate change.” On the 7th, the Ministry of Environment reported ‘water control paradigm shift measures’ at a meeting of ministers related to current state affairs presided over by Prime Minister Han Deok-soo. The Ministry of Environment announced at this event that it will actively pursue expansion of the ‘water bowl’ through the construction of new dams to respond to extreme flooding. This measure came about after the government and ruling party requested a full review of existing flood control measures after heavy rain in the central region last summer caused large-scale damage to life and property. The Ministry of Environment announced that it will first pursue the expansion of water resources through the construction of new dams to respond to extreme flooding. To this end, the basic concept and feasibility study project costs for 10 dams proposed by the region have been included in next year’s budget already submitted to the National Assembly. The Ministry of Environment plans to specify candidate sites for new dam construction and dams subject to remodeling in the ‘River Basin Water Resources Management Plan’ early next year. At a preliminary briefing on the 5th, Minister of Environment Han Hwa-jin said, “In preparation for extreme flooding, we will expand the water supply through a two-track system of national leadership and regional suggestions.” He added, “In addition to the dams suggested by the region, the Ministry of Environment will directly monitor local flooding and water shortage situations.” “We will review and build new dams of an appropriate size in areas where they are needed, and if there is suitable space, we will also pursue large dams,” he said. The Ministry of Environment’s decision to build a new dam is a direct reversal of the dam policy established during the previous administration. In September 2018, the Ministry of Environment at the time said, “We are shifting the paradigm of dam policy from construction to management,” and stopped the construction of six state-led dams, including the Imcheon Dam on the Nakdong River (reservoir capacity 170 million tons), which were included in the long-term dam construction plan at the time. It has been done. If the Ministry of Environment takes the lead in constructing new dams, it is highly likely that these dams, which have been suspended, will be reviewed first. However, an official from the Ministry of Environment said, “We will not review what we reviewed in the past, but will report on the current watershed situation.” Water resources experts believe that the construction of large-scale dams requires long-term planning and is not easy to obtain social consent, so it will not be easy to realize it during the current government’s term of office, which has about three years left. The Ministry of Environment also evaluated that river maintenance has been carried out passively so far, and announced that it would move away from the existing method of focusing on new and restoration of embankments and begin full-scale maintenance of tributaries and streams, including dredging of sediments. This plan is in response to President Yoon Seok-yeol’s special emphasis after the floods in the central region this summer that “river dredging is the number one priority for flood control.” To this end, the Ministry of Environment submitted next year’s budget to the National Assembly, which increases the river maintenance project cost by 47% (KRW 211.7 billion) from this year’s (KRW 451 billion), including dredging 1.92 million ㎥ of sediment from 19 national rivers. In addition, when the water level of the inflowing national rivers rose, it was decided to designate about 400 local river sections across the country with poor drainage as ‘drainage affected sections’ and directly repair them. The project cost to prioritize 38 of these areas has already been allocated in next year’s budget. Environmental impact assessments will also be simplified so that river maintenance can be carried out quickly. The Ministry of Environment decided to allow river maintenance projects for which environmental impact assessment items were reviewed at the stage of establishing a basic river plan to skip the environmental impact assessment. It was also decided to revise the Enforcement Decree of the Environmental Impact Assessment Act and change the river basic plan from a strategic environmental impact assessment subject to an abbreviated strategic environmental impact assessment subject. An official from the Ministry of Environment explained, “This is to allow the collection of residents’ opinions on the draft and the consultation process for the main plan to be carried out simultaneously during the strategic environmental impact assessment process.” However, it is pointed out that if an abbreviated strategic environmental impact assessment is applied to the Environmental Impact Assessment Act, the evaluation items, scope, and methods can be simplified, so the evaluation of the environmental impact of rivers, which are particularly ecologically important, can be simplified. In particular, concerns are raised about the omission of environmental impact assessments as there may be a time gap between the establishment of a 10-year basic river plan and the start of individual river maintenance projects, and the river environment may have changed in the process. These flood defense measures announced by the Ministry of Environment were criticized among experts in the fields of climate change, rivers, and water resources as “a return to past flood control policies.” Choi Dong-jin, director of the Climate Change Action Research Institute, said, “In the era of climate change, heavy rain is concentrated in a small area, causing damage, so we concluded that flood defenses centered on large-scale structures (such as dam construction) cannot respond. Accordingly, it has already been a long time ago. “Worldwide, the flood control paradigm has shifted to providing ‘space for flooding,’ selectively protecting it, and minimizing damage, but the Ministry of Environment’s plan is almost a return to the flood control paradigm of the 1990s,” he said. Yeom Hyeong-cheol, CEO of the Social Cooperative Han River, who served as a member of the National Water Management Committee, also said, “During recent heavy rains, casualties are usually caused by landslides or being swept away by river rapids, which cannot be prevented by dams or dredging. “It’s a regression in water management policy,” he said. Representative Yeom said, “The push for dam construction and dredging without serious review of effectiveness and feasibility looks similar to the Lee Myung-bak administration’s Four Major Rivers Project.” This flood control measure is the first to be introduced since the ‘unification of water management’ was implemented by the Ministry of Environment in 2020. Park Chang-geun, president of the Korean River Studies Society (professor of civil engineering at Catholic Kwandong University), said, “The reason the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport handed over river management duties to the Ministry of Environment to unify water management was because there was a social expectation that the Ministry of Environment would ‘do a good job while also taking the environment into account.’ “To announce it is to deny the reason for one’s existence,” he said. Senior Reporter Kim Jeong-su jsk21@hani.co.kr