From JOSEPH S LARSON
Fred Pearce’s article on the controversial Danube dams in Hungary (Forum,
16 December 1989) elicited criticism from Montague Keen (Letters, 27 January)
who suggested that if Pearce had examined the dam projects with the engineers
responsible for the design and future operation of the project he might
well have found that the benefits outweighed the adverse ecological impacts.
Keen also pointed out, correctly, that a large number of scientific institutions
in Hungary had studied the impacts.
As a member of a team who did visit the sites with the Hungarian engineers,
I would like to share with your readers an additional viewpoint. In October
1988, a 10-person team from the University of Massachusetts, including biologists,
engineers, planners and an environmental lawyer, spent a week in Hungary
at the invitation of a Hungarian governmental agency. Our task was to give
advice on minimising the adverse impacts postulated from the dams. We visited
the dam sites at Dunakliti and Nagymaros and met with many engineers, academicians,
planners and biologists who had first-hand knowledge of details of the project.
Included in our team were a native Hungarian and a second Hungarian-speaking
person.
We were provided, by the government engineers, with details of the benefits
of the project, much as were summarised in Keen’s letter. We met with representatives
of the many scientific groups that had studied the impacts. We learnt of
much concern on the part of the scientists who contributed to the studies
and reviewed their recommendations. While many scientific/academic groups
had contributed there was almost no communication between them. Nor did
any one group know who the other contributors were. Participants did not
see or read what was reported by groups other than their own. Many times
we were told by scientists that the published government summaries of the
programme read as if their studies had not been done. Rarely were detailed
responses offered by the government in response to their concerns.
Our team reported to the Hungarian government that adverse impacts on
existing and potential water supplies, the quality of the Danube river water
itself, fisheries, wetlands of international importance, agriculture, rare
and endangered species and the cultural values of the Danube Bend were potentially
significant. We found that plans to mitigate these impacts were in no way
as well-developed as the engineering of the structures – which, by the way,
appeared to meet very high standards.
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Mitigation proposals involving maintenance of minimum flows were generally
vague and unquantified. Water quality maintenance depended upon major expenditures
on pollution treatment facilities by Hungary and Czechoslovakia that appeared
wishful at best. No scheme had been developed to manage multiple demands
and seasonal adjustments for simultaneous allocation of water for the needs
of power generation, navigation, agriculture, fish breeding, wildlife habitat,
maintenance of municipal wells and protection of future aquifiers.
With respect to the role of the dam project in the future energy needs
of Hungary, it appears that the entire scheme was conceived and implemented
without any comprehensive energy planning process. Thus, while there is
a long-term, but apparently not near-term, need for more energy generation
capacity, one cannot say with any assurance what role the dam project would
play in a least-cost expansion strategy. It does appear that time is still
available to do a comprehensive study. Our team recommended that the Nagymaros
dam ought not to be built. We concluded that if the Dunakliti site is to
be finished much more needs to be done to assure that major adverse impacts
on health, welfare, safety and environmental functions will be avoided.
Joseph S. Larson Professor and Director The Environmental Institute
University of Massachusetts at Amherst
