By Chen Meihua | 2025-08-11

A new Chinese dam project is inflaming tensions with India and Bangladesh.

The Brahmaputra river is one of the key waterways in South Asia. It sustains fertile plains and the livelihoods of millions of inhabitants downstream. Now, with China moving ahead on a "super dam" in Tibet, this lifeline could be imperiled.

Construction of a new hydropower project on the lower Yarlung Tsangpo river began on July 19. Chinese Premier Li Qiang announced the start of the project in Nyingchi, Tibet, according to Xinhua. The river is known as the Brahmaputra river in India.

Operations are expected to begin after 2030. According to Chinese media, the dam will cost approximately 1.2 trillion CNY ($166.4 billion) and could generate three times the power of the Three Gorges Dam, which is currently the world's largest. Once complete, it could provide power for hundreds of millions of consumers.

It is expected to replace large amounts of coal and cut carbon emissions. Officials are touting it as a "project of the century." It signals a surge in public investment to boost growth, Reuters reported.

Concerns in India, Bangladesh, Tibet

However, downstream countries India and Bangladesh have expressed concern. India's Ministry of External Affairs is "carefully monitoring" the project, citing potential risks to water security, ecology and livelihoods, according to the Economic Times.

Bangladesh sent a letter to China in February formally requesting four key documents: an environmental impact assessment, a feasibility study and assessments of climate and disaster impacts.

Tibetans have protested dams that China is building, calling them resource exploitation of Tibet.

Last year, Chinese authorities arrested hundreds of demonstrators who were protesting yet another planned dam in Tibet, the Gangtuo.

Building a hydropower project is "fully within China's sovereignty," China's Foreign Ministry spokesman, Guo Jiakun, stated in late July.

A 'ticking bomb'

India has made clear its misgivings.

Pema Khandu, the chief minister of Arunachal Pradesh, the Indian state immediately downstream, called the project "a big threat" that could dry up the river or be weaponized to unleash a flood costing hundreds of thousands of lives.

He denounced China for not signing international water-sharing agreements. The dam is a "ticking water bomb," he said.

"The issue is that China cannot be trusted. No one knows what they might do," he said.

China views water resources as a geopolitical tool, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) said in a July article.

China could control the river's flow, the ASPI said, either restricting it during dry seasons or releasing it to trigger floods.

In addition, dam infrastructure, such as access roads, could enable Chinese troops to rush to the Indian border.

"Control over these rivers effectively gives China a chokehold on India's economy," Oxford political science graduate student Ameya Pratap Singh and Indian trade lawyer Urvi Tembey wrote in The Interpreter in 2020, referring to seven South Asian rivers that have headwaters in Tibet.

They are the Indus, Ganges, Brahmaputra, Irrawaddy, Salween, Yangtze and Mekong.

Environmental risks

Besides deliberate Chinese policy, nature can endanger the countries downstream of Tibet once the Yarlung Tsangpo dam is complete.

The mega-dam will damage the Tibetan Plateau's ecology and affect millions of residents, Reuters, citing nongovernmental organizations, reported in July.

Climate change is melting glaciers and altering rainfall patterns, Mehebub Sahana, a geographer at the University of Manchester in England, wrote in The Conversation in April.

Combined with sudden releases of water from the dam, it could intensify both water scarcity and flood risks. Sediment trapped by the dam will harm downstream agriculture and threaten food security, said Sahana.

The project "could destabilize the already vulnerable Himalayan ecosystem and arm China with a powerful new lever over India," Indian geostrategist Brahma Chellaney told CNBC-TV18.

A strategic railroad

Meanwhile, China continues building in fragile Tibet and raising its neighbors' hackles.

Within a month of announcing the Tibetan super dam, China launched another major infrastructure project: a strategic railroad connecting Hotan, Xinjiang region, and Lhasa, Tibet. A new state-owned company, Xinjiang-Tibet Railway Co. is managing the project, backed by capital of 95 billion CNY ($13.2 billion).

The new railroad is set to run through some of the world's most arduous terrain, along India's northern borders in Ladakh.