Index to the 1981 TAR map

A previous Tibetan Plateau blog post shared a downloadable link to a detailed map of Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR). The map was published by the TAR Bureau of Cartography in 1981.

We have more good news: there is an exhaustive index for the 1981 TAR map available online here. This 500+ page index is compiled by Gregor Verhufen (Thank you Gregor!) in 1995.

 


The 1981 TAR map and the 1995 index to the map, together, undoubtedly constitute one of the richest and most helpful sources of information on (close to 9000!) Tibetan names of places, rivers, mountains, glaciers and lakes.

The map and the index, however, does not have names of Tibetan places outside TAR. Those interested in information on Tibetan places outside TAR are advised to refer to Steven Marshall and Susette Cooke's report, TIBET: Outside the TAR, which, hopefully, is still available for sale through the International Campaign for Tibet. Parts of the Marshall and Cooke's report are available here.

Readers are requested to share these resources with researchers and other people interested in Tibet.

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Tibetan language map of Tibet Autonomous Region

The Tibetan Plateau blog is pleased to make the most detailed Tibetan language map of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) we have seen so far available for download.
 
Although this is a relatively old map, published in 1981 by the TAR Bureau of Cartography, it is the best we have seen in terms of detail, showing settlements down to the level of villages below the township level. The map also shows roads, railway lines, hydro-dams and environmental features such as glaciers, desert, lakes and springs. Here are examples of the amazing level of detail in the map. The scale of the map is 1: 1000000.


A warning before you download the map: this is a huge (25 MB) JPEG file. If your computer has sufficient storage space and other resources, you can download the map here.

We hope that this map will be useful for students, researchers and others who are interested in Tibet.

With thanks to all the readers for their interest and support.

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India poorly informed about Chinese dam project

In recent days, Indian media has been running a story that China has "admitted" that it is building a dam (Zangmu) project on the Yarlung Tsangpo (Brahmaputra River). It is strange that this "news" is presented as some some shocking new information. There is a lot of misinformation being spread around in the media.

China acknowledging that it is building the Zangmu hydropower project should not be "news" because the project has long been openly advertised on official Chinese websites. There should not be any question of admission about things that are open public knowledge. Tibetan Plateau blog reported on the construction of Zangmu dam more than a year ago, in English!

New reports say that India came to know about construction of Zangmu project after its "intelligence agencies" received satellite images of construction work going on for the Zangmu project last fall. This was widely (mis)reported in Indian media late October 2009. I suppose the Indian External Affairs Minister, the person who brought the "news" from his Chinese counterpart, raised Indian concerns about the Zangmu project based on these satellite images. Indian reliance on vague satellite images as some kind of evidence is embarrassing because chinese official websites have been carrying clear photos of Zangmu construction work (see below) and models of completed project for a long time.





Then there is the issue of serious misinformation. In my previous post on misinformation about Zangmu project, I identified confusions about Zangmu project's location and use as a water diversion project. The same confusion continues, here and here are a couple of examples.

Indian media and online writers cannot be blamed too harshly for treating this as "news" and being confused about location of the project, even Hong Kong based South China Morning Post is in the same boat. Zangmu project is located in the middle reaches of Yarlung Tsangpo on the Tibetan Plateau in dZam (རྫམ་) township of Lhokha (Shannan) Prefecture of Tibet Autonomous Region, about 140 km southeast from Lhasa, between Zangs-Ri (Sangri) and rGya-Tsha (Jiacha) counties.

Here is a high resolution image of Zangmu project under progress from GeoEye that is annotated by one of Tibetan Plateau blog's consultants. Tibetan Plateau blog is responsible for the annotation.


Tibetan Plateau blog will soon be posting a map of planned hydropower projects on the Yarlung Tsangpo river. There are more than the five projects "admitted" by China that are planned on the river. Stay tuned.

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Dams on Machu/Yellow River/Huanghe (Northeast Tibetan Plateau)

I am pleased to publish this map of hydropower projects on the upper Yellow River, also known as Machu (᪵ᨋᩛᨋ) [རྨ་ཆུ་] in Tibetan and Huanghe in Chinese. Many thanks to my amazing map maker and to all the readers who have provided us information and feedback. If you find the following map of dams in Northeast Tibetan Plateau of interest, check out related maps of dams on the eastern edges of the Tibetan Plateau. We are working on more maps, so please stay tuned.





For the sake of simplicity and accuracy, a project's Status is shown under four possible values: Built/Operational, Under Construction, Under Active Consideration, and Proposed. 

The term "Built" includes HPPs that have started generating power but are not complete, as well as those that have been operational but are currently non-functional. 

"Under Construction" indicates that work is proceeding on the ground and does not necessary entail that the river has been blocked or diverted. 

"Under Active Consideration" includes projects in which the design, environmental issues, financing etc. are being developed as well as those that have been discussed but have never made it to the drawing board in any serious way. 

"Cancelled" includes only those projects for which there is widespread agreement that the government has decided that the proposed projects will not go ahead. This does not mean that a similar project may not be in the works to get around of the cancellation of the original project.

Capacity is given in Megawatts. This should be understood to be the planned maximum rated power generation capacity of the generators of a HPP when it is completed. While every effort has been made to ensure accuracy, these figures are often given somewhat different values in different sources. Power generation capacity of hydropower generators is developing quickly so they may change.

Information shared here are obtained from the Northwest Hydro Consulting Engineers, CHECC, a Qinghai government website, and a number of other web based resources. Chinese and non-Chinese maps of the area have been used for geographical information.

The maps are only approximately to scale. The positions of the hydropower projects are approximate. A professional map should be used for more accurate geographic information.

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Updated* maps of dams: Eastern Tibet

*The maps on this blog, and the details, have been updated since it was first posted. Special thanks to Fan Xiao, the chief engineer of the Sichuan Geology and Mineral Bureau in Chengdu, for providing details on Minjiang dams. What follows is the most up to date publicly available information on hydropower projects in the region.

This is an update on maps I shared on this blog on Zungchu/Minjiang and Gyarong Ngulchu/Dadu rivers. Thanks to encouraging and informative feedback from Bruce Lee, Fan Xiao, Kevin Li, Stone Routes, and from Probe International researchers, the following maps and tables provide a unique and reliable information on dams on the eastern edges of the Tibetan Plateau.

For the sake of simplicity and accuracy a project's Status has only four possible values: Built, Under Construction, Planned/Proposed, and Cancelled. The term "Built" includes HPPs that have started generating power but are not complete, as well as those that have been operational but are currently non-functional. "Under Construction" indicates that work is proceeding on the ground and does not necessary entail that the river has been blocked or diverted. "Planned/Proposed" includes those HPPs that are those projects which the design, environmental issues, financing etc. are being developed as well as those that have been discussed but have never made it to the drawing board in any serious way. "Cancelled" includes only those projects for which there is widespread agreement that the government has decided that the proposed projects will not go ahead. This does not mean that a similar project may not be in the works to get around of the cancellation of the original project.

Capacity is given in MegaWatts. This should be understood to be the planned maximum rated power generation capacity of the generators of a HPP when it is completed. While every effort has been made to assure their accuracy, these figures are often given somewhat different values in different sources. Power generation capacity of hydropower generators is developing quickly so they may change.

Height is given in meters and indicates the total height of the dam associated with the HPP.

United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Clean Development Mechanism (UNFCCC CDM) assisted projects have been included on the tributaries map for three reasons. One is simply that reliable information is available for them. A second reason is that they provide examples of the thousands of small HPPs built throughout China which may (or may not) have negative consequences to the environment or local residents. A third reason they are shown is that they are examples of where Carbon Trading funds are going, which means that the general public overseas are subsidizing these projects since the Carbon Credits bought are tax deductible in developed nations. The CDM reports are available on the internet and at the UNFCCC site. More information regards UNFCCC at Wikipedia.

GYARONG NGULCHU or DADU RIVER


MEGOE TSO and TIANWAN HE


Click on the image below for details on Gyarong Ngulchu and Tianwan He dams



Hydropower Project on Zungchu / Minjiang River


Dams on the tributaries of Zungchu/Minjiang


Click on image below for details on Zungchu/Minjiang dams


Sources of data presented here: websites of Probe International, UNFCCC, China Guodian Corp., and a number of other web based resources. Various Chinese and non-Chinese maps of the area have been used for geographical information. The maps are only approximately to scale. The positions of the hydropower projects are approximate. A detailed professional map should be used for more accurate geographic information.

Suggested reading on policy implications of these dam projects."

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Dams on Gyarong Ngulchu or Dadu River

[Note: Refer to this updated post]

This is a quick post to share a couple of maps which show hydropower projects on the eastern fringes of the Tibetan Plateau. As rivers on "mainland China" are dammed and diverted beyond recognition, Chinese dam builders and hydro-engineers are looking towards the Tibetan Plateau for more business. Owing to this trend, more and more dams are being built on the rivers of the eastern parts of the Tibetan Plateau, mainly in Western Sichuan or Kham region. You may read an article on the policy implications of these dam projects.

Information on these maps have been obtained from websites of the Probe International, China Guodian Corp, Tibet Justice Center, and a number of other web based resources which served to verify or correct the main sources. Many thanks to my ghost map maker and to Kevin Li for corrections and clarifications on the facts, and for detailed information on the Tianwanhe Cascade. Chinese and non-Chinese maps of the area have been used for geographical information and the maps are only approxiamtely to scale. The positions of the hydropower projects are approximate.



This first map shows dams on the Dadu River, known to Tibetans as Gyarong Gyalmo Ngulchu (རྒྱལ་རོང་རྒྱལ་མོ་རྔུལ་ཆུ་). Shown dam projects also include those downstream of the Tibetan Plateau to help researchers who may find locating different dam names on the river confusing. For more information on these hydropower projects, see the table at the end of this post.



This second map shows on two tributaries of Gyarong Ngulchu, Wasi River and Tianwan. The Megoe Tso dam project shown on this map became controversial due to opposition from local Tibetans, who consider the lake (also known as the Yeti Lake and Megucuo) as sacred.


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Police shoot at Tibetan protesters: which dam project is it?

Two weeks ago in Tawu region in Kandze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, there was a major protest against relocation of tens of thousands of Tibetans to make room for a dam/reservoir. The most shocking part of news was that officials from China's Public Security Bureau and People's Armed Police shot "indiscriminately" into the crowd and left six Tibetan women "seriously wounded." I blogged about the news sharing some photos and Google Earth images of the region.

Unfortunately, there is very little information about the protest. Both Tibetan language and English language sources use the same narrative about the incident with no specific information about the dam project. This leaves us wondering: how are so many Tibetans affected by a dam project? Which dam project is this? Here are my answers (please correct me if you think I am wrong):

It is the Lianghekou dam project (see copyright-free map below). The Lianghekou is a very large reservoir that will be built at the confluence of three rivers: Nyagchu (or Yalong), Qingda and Xianshui (does anyone know the Tibetan name for this river? Is it Dachu? Zhe Chu?). It is designed as one of the three regulatory reservoirs for 21 dams that are built/planned on the Nyagchu River by the Ertan Hydropower Development Company. According to information on company's website, the reservoir's capacity is 6.33 billion cubic meters, the second largest on the river. It is estimated that the reservoir will extend 90 km from the dam up the Nyagchu, 80 km up the Xianshui River approaching Tawu, and 28 km up the Qingda (see google earth image below).


[This map is copyright-free. Please use it!]


[Rough estimation of Lianghekou Reservoir extension according to altitude and distance. This is guesswork: do not use this image. Stay tuned. I will post more accurate information soon]

Who funds these dam projects?
Ertan Hydropower Development Company is jointly owned by China's State Development & Investment Corporation (48% of shares), the Sichuan Provincial Investment Group Co., Ltd. (48%), and China Huadian Corporation (4%). According to the General Manager Chen Yunhua, Ertan Hydroelectric Project was "the only project world-wide which received, as a single project, the biggest sum of loan (930 million USD equivalent) from the World Bank" (see p.5 of the link).

Is the project good for the local people, the economy or the environment?
Agriculture and pastoralism are the main livelihoods of the people in the region. The Lianghekou Reservoir will inundate most of the farms (agricultural fields) and villages within the area it will cover. The area is also famous for its forests and beautiful lakes. Below is a Google Earth image as an example of farmland and forest area near the Xianshui River that will be inundated by the reservoir. Marshall and Cooke has written about China's disturbing logging practices in the region, which probably continued until such practices were banned in the late 90's due to flooding downstream in the Yangtze River. I also found this essay about the region's wondrous beauty by a little girl from Kangding (Dartsedo) Middle School.



If the project is so bad for the local economy, the environment and the people, one has to ask why local authorities are so adamant about the project going ahead that they would shoot at protesters. What do you think?
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The Qinghai Lake eco-environmental protection and comprehensive management project

Map source: QInghai Province website

In May 2008, the government of Qinghai Province launched the 10-year project to restore the ecological integrity of Lake Kokonor (called Tso Ngon by Tibetans, མཚོ་སྔོན་) region. Key environmental protection objectives include protection of wildlife biodiversity, wetlands and the grasslands of the region, which are believed to be threatened by global warming, desertification, human encroachment, over-grazing by yaks and sheep, and also by rodents and pests.

The project area is 30,000 square kilometers in size and comes with a promissory central government funding of $227 million. This project follows the example of a larger conservation project in the same province, the Three Rivers Headwaters Nature Reserve.

Measures to achieve project goals include planting trees and shrubs, controlling rodents and insect pests, and curtailing grazing on grasslands by fencing and "ecological migration" of nomadic herders living in the region.

Plantation of trees and shrubs sounds fine but I wonder what species of plants are being used and if these are sustainable considering local ecology.

Government measures to control rodents on the Tibetan Plateau have been controversial. The mainstream assumption of the government, supported by many local people, is that rodents, which have been found to be rapidly increasing in population, are causing grassland degradation and are competing for forage with livestock. The three main rodent species are plateau pikas (Ochotona curzoniae), voles (Microtus brandti), and zokors (Myospalax baileyi). The government has undertaken many poisoning campaigns to exterminate these little animals in the last few decades. The rodenticides not only killed target animals but also many other species of plants and animals.

In 1999, an important study was published in the journal of Animal Conservation by Andrew Smith and Mark Foggin that shattered the logic of this poisoning campaign. Smith and Foggin argued that the plateau pikas are a "keystone species" which provide essential ecosystem functions to the Tibetan Plateau. The animals are a major food source for wolves, brown bears and most of the large predatory birds of the plateau. The scientists also found that many nesting bird species use pika burrows as shelters for breeding. The increasing number of rodents on the Tibetan Plateau are a symptom, not a cause of environmental degradation.

Another important study by a team of scientists found that grazing is not the cause of rangeland degradation on the Tibetan Plateau but climate warming. Research experiments found that simulated grazing actually dampens loss of plant species diversity caused by climate warming. The team of scientists have also published an argument in the journal Ecological Applications.

There are a ton of studies that have looked at the implications of fencing of Tibetan rangelands. My advisor Tsering Shakya once told me that the academic/scientific consensus on the topic clearly show that the policy has been a disastrous failure. I have read reports from wildlife scientists such as the one here by noted biologist George Schaller who argue that fencing causes problems for many endangered animals such as the Tibetan Antelope (Pantholops hodgsonii) and the Tibetan gazelle (Procapra przewalskii). These animals and the local people prefer their grasslands to be open without fences. This study, for example, indicates fencing actually exacerbating overgrazing and causing health problems among Tibetan pastoralist communities.

I think the most important perspective on this topic would be those of the nomads who are directly affected by the projects. My colleagues at TEAM will be interviewing some of these people. If anyone else have any information or insights to share, please let me know.

Before I end this blog, I want to mention about two earlier posts relating to the project area. One was about a government edict which admits there is a problem of illegal gold mining in the region. We also translated a news story about skirmish between nomads and fisherman near the lake.
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Accuracy of Three Rivers Headwaters Nature Reserve Map

A friend just forwarded a link to Chinese language maps of Three Rivers Headwaters (San Jiang Yuan) Nature Reserve and "Qinghai Lake eco-environmental protection and comprehensive management project". This link is from the official website of Qinghai Province. Here is its SNNR map.




I am pleased to say that the map of SNNR confirms the accuracy of the SNNR map that was released on this blog last month (February 2009). Of course, our map provides more details, including demarcation of zoning systems within the subareas of the reserve.

I will post a separate blog about the map of Qinghai Lake eco-environmental protection and comprehensive management project" since this is the first time I am writing about it.
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Tibetan Language Maps of Three Rivers Headwaters region

A kind supporter of Tibetan Plateau donated some photos of Tibetan maps showing Yushu, Nangchen, Drito, Zato, Chumarleb and other areas of SNNR. The maps were published by Tibet Information Network, a reproduction of "བོད་རང་སྐྱོངས་སྲིད་འཛིན་ས་ཁུལ་གྱི་ས་བཀྲ་", a set of nine maps made by the Chinese authorities in 1981. Since Tibetan language maps are quite rare, I hope these will be of interest to many people, especially Tibetan readers.














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Update on SNNR map and related China Beat Blog article

Update: SNNR subarea #7 Zhaling-Eling Hu (མཚོ་སྐྱ་རིང་སྔོ་རིང་)་extends into Dulan County, Haixi Mongolian & Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture. This news wasn't too surprising as mentioned in SNNR Map Description that SNNR subarea boundaries cross administrative borders. Map in previous blog entry has been updated. We are working on further improvements.

An excellent article related to SNNR on The China Beat blog by Ken Pomeranz . Here's an excerpt focusing on Tibet's water:

[The] state has chosen a massive three-pronged effort to move water from South to North China – by far the biggest construction project in history, if it is completed. Part of the Eastern section began operating this year, and the Central section is also underway (though the December 31Wall Street Journal reported a delay due to environmental concerns). The big story in the long run, however is the Western line [in SNNR], which will tap the enormous water resources of China’s far Southwest – Tibet alone has over 30 percent of China’s fresh water supply, most of it coming from the annual run-off of some water from Himalayan glaciers. (This is an aspect of the Tibet question one rarely hears about, but rest assured that all the engineers in China’s leadership, including Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao, are very much aware of it. Tibetans, meanwhile, not only see a precious resource going elsewhere when their water is tapped: they regard many of the lakes and rivers to be dammed as sacred.) The engineering challenges in this mountainous region are enormous, but so are the potential rewards, both in water supply and in hydropower – the electricity water can generate is directly proportional to how far it falls into the turbines, and the Yangzi, for instance, completes 90 percent of its drop to the sea before it even enters China proper. The risks, as our two stories make clear, are social and political as well as environmental…

Call the two news stories the “double glacier shock.” On December 9, Asia Times Online reported that China was planning to go ahead with a major hydroelectric dam and water diversion scheme on the great bend of the Yarlong Tsangpo River in Tibet. The hydro project is planned to generate 40,000 megawatts – almost twice as much as Three Gorges. But the water which this dam would impound and turn northwards currently flows south into Assam to form the Brahmaputra, which in turn joins the Ganges to form the world’s largest river delta, supplying much of the water to a basin with over 300 million inhabitants. While South Asians have worried for some time that China might divert this river, the Chinese government had denied any such intentions, reportedly doing so again when Hu Jintao visited New Delhi in 2006. But when Indian Prime Minister Singh raised the issue again during his January, 2008 visit to Beijing, the tone had changed, with Wen Jiabao supposedly replying that water scarcity is a threat to the “very survival of the Chinese nation,” and providing no assurances. And so it is – not only for China, but for its neighbors. Most of Asia’s major rivers – the Yellow, the Yangzi, the Mekong, Salween, Irrawaddy, Brahmaputra, Ganges, Sutlej, and Indus – draw on the glaciers of the Himalayas, and all of these except the Ganges have their source on the Chinese side of the border. Forty-seven percent of the world’s people, from Karachi to Tianjin, draw on those rivers.
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Mapping Three Rivers Headwaters Nature Reserve (Updated)

In May 2000, China declared the establishment of its largest nature reserve on the Tibetan Plateau: the San Jiang Yuan (Three Rivers Headwaters) National Nature Reserve (SNNR). Since then, China’s plans to protect the headwaters of the Yangtze (Drichu), Yellow (Machu) and Mekong (Zachu) rivers have received a lot of media attention. This recent BBC story, for example, highlights the relocation of '100,000 nomadic Tibetans.' However, there is very little information about the specifics of the plan in all of the published sources that I have come across. There isn't a single definitive map of SNNR. So I collaborated with some colleagues, who wish to remain anonymous, and prepared a new map of SNNR area using information compiled over the last few months. I am pleased to release the map here.

[Click on the image to view/download this (updated: Feb 20, 09) copyright free map]

This map is the most accurate and informative publicly available document of its kind on SNNR to date. It throws new light to the debates about SNNR and other nature reserves on the Tibetan Plateau. We have taken every possible step to ensure its accuracy, including crosschecks between different maps, reviews by experts who work in the region, and consultations with people from this region. Information we are currently doubtful are mentioned in a detailed description that should be used alongside with the map. There are no copyrights to the map, so please feel free to use it for educational purposes. We hope to produce better maps and reports on SNNR both in English and Tibetan languages in the future.

[Counties covered under the Three Rivers Headwaters Region. Maps are copyright free.]

To me, the establishment of SNNR and other nature reserve parks in Tibet raises many questions. According to a Chinese white paper on the environment of Tibet [Autonomous Region (TAR)], the government has established 70 nature reserve parks in the region between 1980 and 2003. The white paper states that 33.4% of TAR’s total land area is covered by nature reserves and that the government will increase the number and size of nature reserves in the region. So the first set of questions, leaving aside the rhetoric of conservation, pertains to the underlying economic and strategic purpose of establishing nature reserves in Tibet. What are the political and economic goals of establishing so many parks in Tibet?

The second set of questions concerns the politics behind scientific discourses of conservation and the relevance of "protected" parks in Tibet. Protection of mountains and grasslands from the nomads and their yaks? The ideas behind nature reserve parks that are applied in Tibet are based on Western ideas and approaches. How appropriate are these in Tibet? Why do governments and scientists continue to treat indigenous perspectives as irrelevant and unsophisticated into the 21st century? After all, these nomads and pastoralists have a proven capacity in maintaining the integrity of their local ecosystem. Their livelihoods depend on it and they have been living there for thousands of years!

I have pointed out elsewhere that the current top-down management approach of exclusion is unfit for nature reserve management in Tibet and developing countries in general. As Dr. Andreas Schild, the Director General of the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development has said in a recent interview that “Mountains without mountain people will be not sustainable.” Surely enough, Tibetan nomads and pastoralists who have been uprooted from their ancestral lands and made to live in concrete houses (see photos below) are facing serious economic and social problems that many have chosen to return to their traditional lifestyle.

[San Jiang Yuan resettlement housing blocks]

My final set of questions is about China’s commitment to environmental protection in relation to its development goals. Does the creation of nature reserves with new laws and regulations lead to environmental protection? How strong are China’s environmental laws? It appears that these laws exist mostly on paper and very little in practice. 

The Government has allowed several mining companies to operate in the "protected" area, including a Canadian company in one of the SNNR wetland conservation subarea of Chumarleb (Chu dMar Leb) county. The Three Rivers Headwaters area is also the site for a major river diversion project which involves construction of least three large dams (wall height of the dams are 175 meters, 295m, and 305m!) on the headwaters of the Yangtze and Yellow rivers, connected by a series of several hundred kilometres long tunnels through a mountain range that separate the two rivers.

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