3.1.5. The Mekong River Commission

The Mekong River Commission (MRC) is another key driving force behind quality energy infrastructure development in the region. As the only treaty-based river basin organization in the region, the 25-year-old MRC has put in place two crucial strategies to guide its four member countries—Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam—in assessing and developing hydropower projects in the Lower Mekong River Basin (LMB) to optimise transboundary benefits while minimising adverse cross-national impacts.

One of them is the basin-wide Sustainable Hydropower Development Strategy (SHDS) for the LMB adopted in 2001 by the MRC Council of Ministers, the organization's highest governing body. The SHDS recognizes that while each member country has the full responsibility and right to plan and implement hydropower projects nationally, the MRC is tasked with striking a balance between regional and basin needs, and economic development and environmental protection [44]. The SHDS thus sets out strategic priorities and actions at the basin level to address hydropower opportunities and risks and strengthens basin-wide cooperation and sustainable development [45]. It also draws a close linkage between the energy and water sectors because the need for linked planning between the energy and water sectors is now more critical than ever before in the Mekong Region.

The Preliminary Design Guidance for Proposed Mainstream Dams in the LMB is another key strategic guidance resource. Adopted in 2009, it provides performance targets and principles for the design and operation of mainstream dams to help avoid, minimize, and mitigate harmful effects and limit the potential for substantial damage [46]. It seeks to establish a common design and operational approach, aiming to meet common objectives and mitigate commonly understood risks, and making it possible for developers to plan for and undertake the assessments and designs for mitigation and management measures as early as possible in the project cycle.

However, both documents are aging and need to be revisited. With rapid development in the basin, especially in the hydropower sector, it is important that the documents are updated, taking into account major changes the basin has faced over the last two decades. Studies by the MRC and others (see [47–53]) have indicated that hydropower dams constructed on the mainstream in the upper part in China where the river is called the Lancang and on the lower reaches where the river is called the Mekong and on tributaries in the LMB had changed the natural flow regime of the river, yielding both opportunities and risks on hydropower development now and in the future. Gathering the significant economic and greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction benefits offered through hydropower development should not come at the expense of the unique and abundant ecosystem services and biodiversity on which so many communities in the basin depend. In addition, although the MRC has a critical role to play in water diplomacy and energy infrastructure development in the region, this and its wider role have not received sufficient credit [54]. Thus, the Mekong River Commission (MRC) needs to evolve, and its founding member countries need to empower it further if the Mekong River is to develop sustainably and responsibly [55,56].
