Besides advantages, hydropower generates difficulties that cannot be estimated as there are no data about the situation before the construction of hydroelectric plants, said Ilya Trombitsky, Executive Director of the International Association of River Keepers Eco-TIRAS of Moldova. During two years, environmental NGOs from Azerbaijan, Armenia, Moldova and Ukraine carried out the selection of assessment methods and their piloting on rivers in their countries. In an international webinar held on the occasion of the completion of the project that was coordinated by Eco-TIRAS, there were presented the results of piloting assessments for some rivers in the EaP countries and the identified obstacles typical for their countries.
Ilya Trombitsky said the project “Ecosystem Services and Hydropower: piloting the European instruments in river basins of the Eastern Partnership countries” was implemented thanks to the Regranting 2020 scheme of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum with financial support from the European Union as part of supporting civil society in the region. The experience of assessing ecosystem services confirms the feasibility of using this concept to solve environmental and economic problems of the development of hydro-construction. “During the two years, we endeavored to assess the impact of hydro-construction on the river ecosystems and the consequences for humans,” stated the director of Eco-TIRAS.
Ruslan Gavrilyuk, representing the National Ecological Centre of Ukraine (Kiev), noted that conservation of biodiversity, restoration of degraded ecosystems is an integral part of the European Green Deal. By 2030, the EU aims to achieve an indicator of protected area of at least 30%. Moreover, the new EU Biodiversity Strategy, as an element of the Green Deal, contains the goal of restoring at least 25 thousand km of free flow of rivers.
“The world is gradually realizing that there is no future without the preservation of ecosystems, that it is not enough to “reduce the impact on the environment”, it is necessary to help nature to recover, otherwise subsequent generations may be left without rivers, forests, steppes,” stated Ruslan Gavrilyuk.
The European Union is actively working towards mapping and assessing ecosystems and their services. In November 2020, a special report of the Biodiversity Strategy Working Group was released, which summarizes the EU's long-term studies. According to the Ukrainian expert, mapping and valuation of ecosystems and ecosystem services will become the backbone of environmental conservation. A tool for preventing the negative impact of new projects is the inclusion of ecosystem services in the procedures for strategic environmental assessment and environmental impact assessment.
Especially relevant is the accounting of ecosystem services for hydropower projects, based on the increased business interest in hydropower, especially small-scale, which is supported by the "green tariff", and the catastrophic state of our rivers, which are in danger of disappearing, and in some cases they disappear under the influence of climate change and anthropogenic influence.
The project was implemented thanks to the Regranting 2020 scheme of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum with financial support from the European Union as part of supporting civil society in the region. Its content is the sole responsibility of the International Environmental Association of River Keepers Eco-TIRAS and the project partners and does not necessarily reflect the views of the European Union.
