Fantastic setting amind the mountains but the fact that there was so little water flowing down the river sort of surprised me though perhaps it should not have. I say this because it is evident looking at the main river that we came along by the road up to San Ignacio (especially where we crossed the river) that flows are low. Now this is perhaps due to this being the drier season or it could be due to alterations to the flows. The matter of whether or not to develop hydropower in relatively pristine environments brings into sharp focus the challenges facing developing countries. How much do you sacrifice of the environment in order to improve social conditions (and if indeed it does improve social conditions?). Hydropower in Belize has with the building of the Challilo Dam been the subject of much contention.
Hydropower projects are usually designed on the basis of past flow records and the assumption that the climate is stable. The one thing we have come to realise with climate change is that we can n o longer use the past records as a guide to the future. So the question becomes; what strategies in your design and evaluation you use to incorporate CC into the development?
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