Karnali under Stress: Livelihood Strategies and Seasonal Rhythms in a Changing Nepal Himalaya

A review of land use, visibility and public perception of renewable energy in the context of landscape impact

Summary Precipitation is critical to the water towers of the Hindu Kush-Himalaya-Karakoram region, exerting an important control on glacier mass balance and the water resources for 1.65 billion people. Given that hydroclimatic extremes and water stress have emerged as key hazards in the context of climate change, Nepal's Khumbu region overlaps key vulnerabilities. Here, we investigate the region's precipitation characteristics and moisture sources through analysis of data from a new high-altitude network of automatic weather stations, which allows for a more complete understanding of the climatological precipitation data that are critical information for local communities in the Khumbu region, visitors, and downstream populations. Our findings demonstrate that the northern Bay of Bengal is potentially an important moisture source during the monsoon period (June to August) and that westerly trajectories over land predominate for precipitation events during the post-monsoon, winter, and pre-monsoon seasons.

Precipitation Characteristics and Moisture Source Regions on Mt. Everest in the Khumbu, Nepal

This chapter looks to provide a contemporary state of the art discourse on the concept of power and to explore how power connects with media and public education within the contemporary social world.

Discourses on power

Plan de acción para los espacios naturales protegidos del estado español

The development of hydroelectricity in the French central Pyrenees at the beginning of the 20 century gave rise to some strong resistance, all in the name of landscape preservation and protection of the tourist resource that it represented. Space had to be shared, and some reserves of picturesque features were obtained from the industrialists, in exchange for a free hand in tourist development. The chapter analyses how the interplay of actors brings about this spatial partition. It shows the ambivalence of the discourse constructed to legitimise it. By looking in depth at the case of the protected site of Gavarnie, it sheds light on the nature of the social issues that were emerging as a background to this resistance to hydroelectricity in the landscape and shows how, through it, the power of an elite as an aesthetic authority, was imposed on communities in the mountain areas. The arrival around 1900 of the energy paradigm of hydroelectric power marked a decisive historical threshold for a great number of mountain massifs in Europe. The development of hydroelectricity first transformed the mountains into an area that welcomed industrial modernity, then, especially after the end of the First World War, into a production area for an energy that could now be transported, and which mainly benefited the low-lying plains. Today this separation of energy production and consumption is almost complete, with the majority of electrometallurgical and electrochemical factories in the high mountain valleys having been dismantled and reconverted. This gives the mountains the status of "energy reserve" (according to the terms used in the 1992 Rio Declaration) which can only be exploited and developed through national and trans-national networks (Blanc and Bonin 2008). The flow of energy between the mountains and the plains which started at the beginning of the 20 century was an extremely powerful vector for assimilating the populations and economies of the mountain areas. This was especially so since at this very time when the mountains were required to satisfy the energy needs of the lowlands and the towns, a new stage was reached in developing the tourist potential of the high massifs, with hydroelectricity creating the conditions for improving the accessibility and attractiveness of the high mountain areas (Bouneau 1997, 2003, Métailié and Rodriguez 2011, Rodriguez 2012). 1 . Traduit du français par Hilary Koziol. 2 This observation and all the analyses that follow are based on the initial results of research entitled "Landscape resources and energy resources in mountains in Southern Europe. History, comparison, experimentation", in the context of the programme Ignis mutat res. Considering architecture, cities and landscapes through the prism of energy, and financed by the Atelier International du Grand Paris. This research covers four mountain regions in Europe: the Sierra Nevada, the Dolomites, the Valais and the Pyrenees.

Ressources paysagères et ressources énergétiques dans les montagnes sud-européennes. Histoire, comparaison, expérimentation

A case study in the Solukhumbu region in northern Nepal reveals that the high number of seasonal tourists—which has doubled in 20 years—has led to growing water, food, and energy demands that have modified agropastoral practices and the use of local resources. This has induced new patterns in the movement of goods, people, and animals in the Everest region and the reconfiguration of the water–energy–food nexus. We use this concept of nexus to analyze ongoing interactions and transformations. Key changes involve (1) massive imports of consumer goods; (2) use of local resources with new techniques (hydropower plants, improved mills, greenhouses, and pipes for domestic networks) that depend on imported materials, which are newly accessible to Sherpas as a result of economic benefits generated by tourism; (3) commodification of local resources (water, hydropower, vegetables, fodder, and flour); (4) an increasing number of electrical appliances; and (5) new uses of water, especially for tourist-related services, including hot showers, watering of greenhouses, bottling of water, and production of electricity for cell phones, rice cookers, and other electric appliances. These new uses, on top of traditional ones such as mill operation, compete in some places during spring when water supplies are low and the tourist demand is high. A transfer of pressure from one resource (the forest) to another (water) has also resulted from the government ban on woodcutting, incentives to develop hydropower, and the competition between lodges to upgrade their amenities by offering better services (such as hot showers, plugs to recharge batteries, internet connections, and local vegetables). Our research finds that water is now central to the proper running of the tourist industry and the region's economy but is under seasonal pressure.

https://bioone.org/journals/mountain-research-and-development/volume-39/issue-1/MRD-JOURNAL-D-17-00080.1/Reconfiguration-of-the-WaterEnergyFood-Nexus-in-the-Everest-Tourist-Region/10.1659/MRD-JOURNAL-D-17-00080.1.pdf

Reconfiguration of the Water–Energy–Food Nexus in the Everest Tourist Region of Solukhumbu, Nepal

The development of hydroelectricity in the French central Pyrenees at the beginning of the twentieth century was met with strong resistance in the name of landscape preservation and the protection of the tourist resource that landscape represented. Space had to be shared, and some reserves of picturesque features were obtained from the industrialists, in exchange for a free hand in tourist development. This chapter analyses how the interaction between the different stakeholders brought about this spatial partition and shows the ambivalence of the discourse constructed to legitimise it. By examining the case of the protected site of Gavarnie in depth, it sheds light on the social issues that were emerging as a background to the resistance to hydroelectricity and its impact on the landscape and shows how, through this resistance, the power of an external elite acting as a self-proclaimed aesthetic authority was imposed on communities in the mountain areas.

The Nature of Resources

Cet article analyse les reconfigurations territoriales liees a l’introduction de la micro-hydroelectricite dans le cycle hydrosocial de la region touristique de l’Everest, ou l’usage du bois est strictement reglemente (Parc national de Sagarmatha). De nombreuses microcentrales de puissance et de qualite inegales sont nees d’initiatives locales soutenues par des acteurs varies, operant a differentes echelles. L’analyse de l’inscription spatiale de la chaine des infrastructures montre que ce dispositif technique s’insere dans un cycle hydrosocial desormais commande par l’activite touristique qui a ameliore les conditions de vie de la population ; et que le passage de l’eau (source) a l’energie (ressource), a revele et genere des inegalites socio-spatiales.

/pdf/dispositifs-techniques-de-la-micro-hydroelectricite-et-5cqtmuzhtq.pdf

Dispositifs techniques de la micro-hydroélectricité et reconfiguration d’un territoire touristique de haute montagne (région de l’Everest, Népal)

La notion de capital environnemental, en s’appuyant sur le terme de capital, a forte connotation economique, propose d’explorer de maniere plus large la question de la valeur en general et des valeurs de l’environnement en particulier. L’objectif de cet article est de s’interesser a ce qui construit la valeur d’un espace dont la valeur intrinseque est faible puisqu’il s’agit d’un tas de sable. La dune du Pilat, Grand Site de France, lieu emblematique du bassin d’Arcachon, haut lieu touristique est un espace tres valorise et producteur de valeurs. Il s’agit ici d’eclairer ce paradoxe et d’evaluer dans quelle mesure la grille de lecture que propose la notion de capital environnemental contribue a mieux prendre en compte la diversite des valeurs de l’environnement.

/pdf/la-dune-du-pilat-au-prisme-du-capital-environnemental-tour-d-4fc843c1tt.pdf

Véronique André-Lamat

Papers

Ressources paysagères et ressources énergétiques dans les montagnes sud-européennes. Histoire, comparaison, expérimentation

Reconfiguration of the Water–Energy–Food Nexus in the Everest Tourist Region of Solukhumbu, Nepal

The Nature of Resources

Dispositifs techniques de la micro-hydroélectricité et reconfiguration d’un territoire touristique de haute montagne (région de l’Everest, Népal)

La dune du Pilat au prisme du capital environnemental : tour d’horizon des valeurs d’un « tas de sable »