Governance of a Transboundary River

The Rhône

Christian Bréthaut, Géraldine Pflieger

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN: 9783030195533
• eBook ISBN: 9783030195540
• Topic: Biological Sciences
• Subtopic: Energy Industry
• Index: Biological Sciences

This book examines the issues at stake in transboundary water governance, it spotlights the Rhône River, a biophysical entity of enormous historical, political and economic importance. The Rhône has long been viewed essentially as a tool for energy production, heavily canalized and exploited by a series of dams and nuclear power plants – with the result that those who live along this great river have simply turned away.
Basing their work on a detailed analysis of the history and the current management of the Rhône, the authors explore the challenges linked with transboundary river basin governance including relevant international water law, appropriation of river and river resources by Nation States. Finally, they discuss a diverse range of institutional architectures and outlines several solutions that might cope with the growing complexity of transboundary management of a major river. The book will be of interest to scholars in fields such asenvironment studies, water policy and Natural Resource Management, it also has relevance to water managers and entrepreneurs concerned with staying abreast of developments in water policy and governance.

© The Author(s) 2020

C. Bréthaut, G. PfliegerGovernance of a Transboundary RiverPalgrave Studies in Water Governance: Policy and Practicehttps://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-19554-0_1

Begin Abstract

1. Exploring the Rhône’s Transboundary Governance

Christian Bréthaut¹ and Géraldine Pflieger²

(1)

UNESCO Chair on hydropolitics, Institute for Environmental Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland

(2)

UNESCO Chair on hydropolitics, Institute for Environmental Sciences, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland

Christian Bréthaut

Email: [email protected]

End Abstract

1.1 General Introduction and Guiding Questions

1.1.1 A Case of Emerging Tension in the Context of Environmental Change: Sediment Flushing Operations Between France and Switzerland

In June 2012, the Verbois Dam was at the heart of the debate on developments in the transboundary governance of the River Rhône. Situated in the Swiss Canton of Geneva and upstream of the border with France, its reservoir had gradually been filled by sediment carried down from the Alps by the Arve, a tributary of the Rhône. This had reduced the efficiency of hydropower generation and increased the flood risk on the outskirts of Geneva. Now, following a nine-year period without any flushing events, a new draining operation was scheduled.

On the Swiss side, this operation was viewed with equanimity; French stakeholders, on the other hand, expressed serious concerns. Public authorities, hydropower operators, environmentalists and the fishing community feared that a wave of sediments would descend, with devastating effects. The 2003 operation was still fresh in everyone’s minds—an event which had had significant impacts, not only on fish populations, riverbanks and nesting birds, but also on key infrastructure such as discharge-regulation outlets, drinking water well fields and the nearby Bugey Nuclear Power Plant. The impact of this event led, in 2006, to a moratorium being declared on the previous practice of three-yearly flushing events. This allowed breathing-space to assess the overall situation, to gain a better understanding of the effect of these sedimentary discharges and to give more careful consideration to the way such operations are implemented.

The draining operation scheduled for 2012 took place in a tense atmosphere, with two significant factors making the procedure particularly complex. First, the operation would discharge a particularly large quantity of sediment. After nine years without any draining, the volume of materials to be discharged would clearly be much greater than that accumulated over a three-year period. Secondly, introduction of the European Union’s Water Framework Directive¹ in 2003 meant that the administrative procedure for conducting such operations on the French section of the river had become much more demanding, even though Switzerland is not a member of the European Union. In the EU, and therefore in France, there is now a requirement that the application for authorization must be submitted to a public enquiry. These new administrative constraints had prolonged proceedings to the point where the draining operation scheduled for 2010 had to be deferred to June 2012.

The operation was launched on 6 June 2012. On that date, the French operator triggered supporting measures for sediment transport, including lowering the water level in the downstream Génissiat Dam in anticipation of the flushing of the upstream Verbois Dam. Flushing began on 9 June, and the water level in the Swiss reservoir fell. On the morning of 10 June, the first materials from the Verbois Dam arrived in France. Weather conditions were not favourable, and heavy rainfall in a number of areas took several tributaries of the Rhône to flood levels. In addition, work being undertaken on the Verbois Dam during the draining operation fell behind schedule. These different factors combined to considerably complicate the operation, leading to difficulties in controlling the concentration of suspended solids in the river. On 11 June, the Compagnie Nationale du Rhône (CNR), the French Rhône operator, announced peak concentrations of 40 g per litre on the stretch of the river from the Verbois Dam to the Génissiat Dam. These levels were in clear breach of French legislation and led to increased fish mortality.

The operation came to an end on 22 June, allowing the Verbois Dam to return to appropriate fill levels: this ensured the safety of the upstream riverside population and re-established the dam’s electricity generation capacities. The unfavourable weather conditions, the particularly large quantities of material to be discharged and the technical restrictions relating to the works being carried out on the Dam meant that the flushing operation had not been easy. It left those involved feeling somewhat ambivalent. The operation had required—and achieved in the beginning—increased Franco-Swiss collaboration throughout the authorization procedure, but had then gone forward in a climate of tension between the different stakeholders. The French and the Swiss sides had both undertaken precautionary fishing before the operation, and fish removal during flushing had helped to preserve the fish population. Nevertheless, end-to-end control of suspended solid loads was not achieved, and this failure resulted in high concentrations that would arouse heated disputes between operators in the months to come.

Our research began as this operation drew to a close. The value of investigating the conditions of change in transboundary river governance was highlighted by the complexity of the procedure, the involvement of multiple stakeholders and of institutions at various levels and the existence of a crisis situation—a major ‘focusing event’ (Birkland, 2004). Investigation in a broad academic perspective is particularly relevant in this context, since governance of the Rhône is not based on any framework agreement, any commission or other international mechanism dedicated to transboundary co-ordination of different uses of the river.

1.1.2 Objectives: From Scholarly Investigation to Support for Decision-Makers

Taking historical and present-day governance of the River Rhône as our core material, our central objective is to understand the practical ways in which stakeholders have co-ordinated their management of this watercourse, which flows between France and Switzerland, and since the early twentieth century. We aim to move away from norms of ‘good governance’ of the river towards an assessment of successive models of transboundary governance, the conditions in which they have existed and their effects on co-ordination of uses and regulation of rivalries.

Three sets of objectives and research questions provide the guiding framework of this book (see Fig. 1.1).

Fig. 1.1

Analytical framework, by chapter

Question 1: What are the conditions in which transboundary governance of the river has changed, and how has such governance evolved in terms of boundaries and scales of intervention and institutional designs for co-ordinating and including different uses?

Our first objective is to understand the system, to identify the different actors involved in managing the river and to analyse the legal relationships between the various parties. This provides us with a better grasp of the bases and robustness of interactions between the actors and of the ways these change over time, in a social and historical perspective. Our approach will also involve an assessment of methods for co-ordinating different uses and for regulating rivalries while still preserving the Rhône’s environmental integrity and its ecosystem, particularly in relation to electricity generation—which has been and remains the predominant form of exploitation of the river. We have set ourselves this objective in order to respond to a knowledge gap, since there has been little academic study of the Rhône’s governance aiming to assess the practical conditions to which it is subject. To date, there has been no in-depth research and systematic analysis, in a transnational perspective, of methods of complex governance of different uses and the resulting upstream–downstream rivalries.

From a methodological point of view, our central hypothesis is that changes in methods of governance (in terms of institutional design, and of scale and scope) are primarily responses to shifts in the main uses and functions of the river, resulting from political, economic and social change in society. One example of this is that the need to take environmental goals into account is now one of the central factors influencing changes in methods of governance of major rivers, which had long centred solely on exploiting hydropower potential or on flood defences. Uses, users and rivalries arising from resource use create conditions that are key to the emergence of one system of water governance over another. The way in which changes in resource use are taken into account in the governance system may also vary according to the local political context and to the physical condition of the resources, in terms of quantity, quality or seasonality.

In this context, we develop a set of questions based on a single overarching one: How has transboundary governance of the river evolved, and under what conditions? The sub questions are:

1. a.
   How have shifts in the river’s major functions, uses and rivalries led to re-examination of modes of governance of the river?
2. b.
   How have models of governance succeeded one another over time and according to what processes of socio-environmental and political change?
3. c.
   What are the major changes in these models in terms of scale of governance and scope of intervention? How have the geographical boundaries of governance systems been defined and how have they changed?
4. d.
   In the absence of a consolidated framework on transboundary governance, how has the river been managed between two countries while still retaining a significant ability to regulate rivalries?

Specific responses to this set of questions will be the focus of Chapters 3 and 4, which analyse the construction of transboundary governance and its historical and social shifts.

Question 2: What are the strengths and weaknesses, from a comparative point of view, of different modes of transboundary governance of the Rhône?

Our second objective is tackled through a comparative analysis of various systems of transboundary governance, which take many different practical forms. These may reflect not only the problems encountered by an entire region but also the political choices and strategic directions defined by the actors. Thus, we note significant contrasts between the various solutions adopted, ranging from—for example—a highly integrated system of co-operation based on unanimous decision-making to the establishment of essentially sectoral systems dedicated to the smooth r...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Front Matter
• 1. Exploring the Rhône’s Transboundary Governance
• 2. Types of Transboundary Water Governance Regimes: Theoretical Discussion and Empirical Illustrations
• 3. From Local Uses Towards Appropriation by Nation-States
• 4. The Emergence of Multifunctional Transboundary River Governance
• 5. Towards Integration? Looking for a Best-Fit Governance Model
• 6. The Franco-Swiss Rhône: A Story of Twists, Turns and Tensions
• Correction to: Towards Integration? Looking for a Best-Fit Governance Model