Bhutan is a landlocked country, in the heart of the Himalayas. Its natural environment is simply staggering in beauty and thanks to strong conservation policies, it hosts one of the world’s richest biodiversity of flora and fauna. For example, in Bhutan, the branches of trees seem to crumble from the weight of the orchids that grow on them. The country has over 590 species being documented. As some orchid specialists say, where there is water, there are orchids. This truth is confirmed in Bhutan (photo left)

Water flows from the Himalayan glaciers and streams are found in every confine of the mountains. They converge in powerful and dangerous rivers. This is one of the key resources of the country. Currently, the country is already exporting electricity to its southern neighbor: India. At present, hydro-power already represents over 17% of the GDP but the Royal Government of Bhutan is in the process of building another two major hydro-power plants that could bring its total production capacity to 11 Megawatts by the year 2020.

With the current policies, the government provides the first 100 Kilowatts of electricity to its people for free. 95% of the people have access to electricity thanks to a very fast development of the power grid, facilitated by the contribution in kind of its people. Power poles are strewn over the hillsides. This has brought a major improvement in the lives of people. It has also allowed the people to reduce reliance on wood-fire (Photo electrical cook stove in school). In this school, where the LoCAL has piloted the use of electrical stoves, Kezang Wangya, the principal explains that they have reduced by half their use of wood (from 19 to 8 trucks per year) to make the daily meals for the 153 boarders that live in school. This mitigation measure also provided the opportunity to build awareness on climate change among the staff and the children.

The electricity grid covers 95% of the population despite the rugged terrain

But what appears to be a mountain of solutions to the country’s development could also be a mountain of problems: in the summer, the ice is melting faster than usual. A few decades ago, the water problem became acute when the threat of bursting glacial lakes became very real. This climate-induced disaster of the glacial lake outburst flood of Lugge Tsho in 1994 took lives and brought about major infrastructural damage. Many agricultural lands were also lost. In order to deal with this problem, the logistics involved were tremendous - over 500 people had to manually build water discharges to bring the level of the lake down by 20 meters. This process was costly and extremely painstaking. It took over 7 years to complete.

The sudden rise in water levels in the rivers has also brought the demise of a number of bridges in the southern part of the country. In some areas, like in the Phobjica valley, more sophisticated bridges were needed to replace the old style wooden log bridges (see the story – Making LoCAL bridges)

But sometime the water has also been lacking. Particularly in the higher altitudes, climate change has translated into a reduction in soil humidification. This has brought deep changes in the way of lives of Yak herders. Some ethnic minorities in the North are almost completely reliant on the Yaks. Many farming people have also traditionally maintained large herds of Yaks. Today, the trade is disappearing. The Yaks cannot find the green pastures they were used to graze on because the soil has gone dry. This has forced many to lower altitudes. But there, the Yaks get sick and many have died, forcing people to turn to other income generating crops such as potatoes. Climate change has already impacted many traditional practices and is forcing authorities to consider new approaches in the management of water.

This problem is familiar to Mr Saha Dev Thapa, District planning officer in Wangdhue district (video - left). During the course of the LoCAL project for example, the district teams had planned to provide water supply to a community – but during the course of the project, the source of water dried out. ‘Every year, we are either closing or changing one water supply source in our district – It is our policy to have 100% of clean water supply for the people but we can never attain it because either the source has dried up or sometimes because of development activities also – but most often the water sources are seen to be drying out – they are becoming smaller and smaller.’

In Zhemgang District, a few hundred kilometers south east of Wangdhue, the LoCAL project also looked at this issue. In the Gewok of Nawgkhor, with the Ministry of Home and Cultural Affairs and local authorities, an old water supply system was rehabilitated successfully. But here again, the challenges are very indicative of the management challenge and the scale of the costs (both financial and human).

Mr Choki Dorji - at the source of the water system in the Nawgkhor Gework

To access the water source, the villagers had to carry all the equipment (sand, ciment and pipes) for over 2 hours of walk in a deep and steep forest hillside. The project would not have been achieved without the contribution of the villagers.

In the past, the villagers had to take water from water points – this brought some health issues as the water was not clean during the whole year. People started developing skin rashes and some became seriously ill. So a water drain was build and for some time the villagers could benefit from a the clean water coming from the other side of the mountain in front. But soon problems emerged again due to land slides. Many of the drains could not withstand the new heavy rains. Many leaks appeared all along the drains.

The LoCAL funding allowed the local authorities to plan for a new pipeline and water storage system. Halfway from the source to the village, a large water tank is used to store water, using a carefully designed siphon system. With this new pipeline and storage system, the villagers do not have to worry about access to clean water. The pipeline runs on top of the hillside and landslides do not affect it anymore. But this system would have to be different in other parts of the country where the winters become harsh.

For example in Wangdhue district, the LoCAL project became the stage for lessons in adaptation. In Phobjica valley, the project supported a low-cost initiative to develop grass areas in a newly build school, at risk of erosion. During the course of the project, the priorities of the headmasters rapidly changed. While the grass areas were successful another problem emerged: the water pipes froze and burst during the winter – the headmaster conceded that if he were to do the LoCAL project again, and given the budget, he would ask for this issue to be fixed as a priority. Today the headmaster is thinking about ways to avoid the cold and bring water to the students. Solar heating devices, burying the pipes deeper underground, creating mid-way water storages…there are a flurry of new adaptation ideas emerging. He is not sure what to do and is asking for the technical support of the project.

The school in Phobjica valley needs a new water piping solution

For Melam Zangpo, Programme manager of LoCAL project and Senior Officer in the Department of Local Governance at the Ministry of Home and Cultural Affairs, the water issues raises key questions about adaptation to climate change in Bhutan. Seeing the issues in these various places, he explains that climate change adaptation takes time and requires a careful balance of both soft and hard components – or in other words, awareness and concrete actions – as ‘it takes time for people to understand the concept of climate change’. But for him, the LoCAL pilot project can now move into a new phase: ‘I think that we should not dilute ourselves into small issues but get into our core business where climate has really impacted, for instance if you wanted to get into activities like water resources which has really been impacted by climate in our case.’

The LoCAL pilot programme was highly beneficial to test and pilot some initiatives in Bhutan and for sure it has helped to build awareness of the decentralised authorities on ways to deal with climate change. The water paradigm in Bhutan can be compared to a mountain of problems but from each of these problems new solutions are developed for climate adaptation. With the LoCAL project, there are mountains of solutions in the making – from the bottom up.