Nepal’s eternal quest for hydropower

The oldest hydropower scheme in Nepal, at Pharping near Kathmandu, was constructed in 1911 at the command of then prime minister Chandra Shamsher Jang Bahadur Rana. Since the 1960s, private developers and INGOs alike have canvassed the country prospecting for good hydropower sites. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been invested in hydropower planning in the last two decades alone. And yet today, Nepal generates a meagre 800MW of hydroelectricity while 60 per cent of the country still has no access to electricity and urban areas require up to 16 hours of load shedding (planned power cuts) during the dry season. These depressing hydropower statistics, however, belie the strength of recent proclamations made by political parties.The Nepali Congress party vowed to generate 5,000MW of electricity within five years. The United Marxist-Leninists followed up by promising to end load shedding in the country by completing all major hydropower projects within ten years. Not to be outdone, the UCPN-Maoist party then said it would end load shedding in three years and produce 10,000MW in the next ten years.Understandably many people in Nepal and in India, who would like to import this energy, are committed to overcoming the impediments to developing Nepal’s hydropower.