A BROADER CONFLUENCE - Dams and Development in China - page 154

cial vacuum, have come together to make China the world's leading financier, engineering
hub, and provisioner of expertise related to hydropower-development projects (Imhof and
Lanza2010).Inarecentreviewofmediareportsandpolicydocuments,KristenMcDonald,
Peter Bosshard, and Nicole Brewer (2009) found ninety-three large dam projects around
the world with financial or technical backing from Chinese firms or government agencies
or a combination of the two. 13 A selection of these projects is shown in table 7.3 .

TABLE 7.3 Selected Dam Projects Around the World with Significant Financial or Technical Involvement by Chinese
Institutions

Dam Project River Project Details

Hatgyi Dam (Myanmar) Salween 1,200 megawatts installed capacity, U.S.$1 billion investment (Sinohydro, China
Southern Power Grid, CPIC, Yunnan Machinery and Equipment Company)

Sambor Hydropower
Project (Cambodia)

Mekong 7,110 megawatts installed capacity (China Southern Power Grid, Guangxi Power In-
dustry Surveying and Design Institute)

Gomal Zam Dam
(Pakistan)

17 megawatts installed capacity, U.S.$190 million investment (Sinohydro, with addi-
tional financing from U.S. Agency for International Development)

Gomal

1,250 megawatts installed capacity (China Exim Bank, China International Water and
Electric, Sinohydro)

Merowe Dam (Sudan) Nile

Lower Kafue Gorge
Power Station (Zambia) Kafue 750 megawatts installed capacity, US.$1 billion investment (Sinohydro)

Chalillo Dam (Belize) Macal 7 megawatts installed capacity (Sinohydro, Yangtze River Commission)

Source : Selected and adapted from McDonald, Bosshard, and Brewer 2009.

Chinese involvement takes various forms and works through diverse contractual ar-
rangements, but two dominant models have emerged. Under the “equipment, procurement,
and construction” model, a given project is entirely in the hands of a Chinese contract-
or—fromthe design ofthe facility tothe provision offinancing toconstruction. The “build,
operate, and transfer” model, by contrast, allows a Chinese company to finance and build
the project and operate it for a set number of years in order to reclaim its initial capit-
al investment and make a profit. When the established time period—often thirty to fifty
years—expires, the company turns the hydropower facility over to the host government for
operation and maintenance. From the perspective of a host government, this arrangement