Who Should Operate Our Hydropower Dams?

The importance of domestic and renewable resources for our national energy security has increased, but the political agenda is different. 

40% of our domestic and renewable hydropower potential is still waiting to be developed. Recently, the energy and food crisis in the world has set the agenda. The US is recreating the world energy equation. The need for countries to develop domestic and renewable energy resources is becoming clearer. 

Our country is largely dependent on foreign energy. However, it is also rich in renewable energy resources such as water, sun and wind. However, we still have not developed a national energy security strategy on how we should develop and operate this domestic and renewable energy potential. As Turkey is heading towards the most critical elections in its history, promises from the opposition and the ruling party are flying through the air. However, there are still no realistic socialist energy strategies that would give hope to all segments of society, from farmers to industrialists, from small tradesmen to citizens who use electricity in their homes. Most of what is put forward as alternative policies are empty promises that are far from the interests of broad segments of society. Therefore, the political agenda in areas such as water, energy, food and the environment, where the basic needs of life are produced and managed, is very sterile and empty. Instead of hope, pessimism is spreading.  

Why was the operation of hydropower plants privatized?

In the past, hydroelectric power dams planned and built by the General Directorate of State Hydraulic Works were transferred to and operated by the Electricity Generation Corporation. 

With the decisions taken by the High Council of Privatization (SCP) between 2008-2014, 57 river and canal power plants (Small HEPP) with a total capacity of 280 MW operated by Electricity Generation Co. (EÜAŞ) were transferred to the private sector with a transfer price of $957 million. 

In addition, between 2016 and 2022, 32 HEPPs with dams of various installed capacities totaling 1573 MW were transferred to the private sector through the Transfer of Operating Rights Method at a cost of 8.4 billion dollars. 

Thus, the operating rights of 89 HEPPs with a total installed capacity of 1853 MW operated by EÜAŞ have been transferred to the private sector for a total of 9 billion 357 million dollars.

The total installed capacity of the hydroelectric power plants currently in the privatization scope program and for which tender preparations are ongoing is 340 MW. 

Our energy sector has been in the grip of neoliberal policies for a long time and has been stuck in a major dependency bottleneck.  The purpose of this article is not to detach the problems in the energy sector from its general context and seek solutions by reducing them to a few questions with an eclectic approach.

However, millions of people in Turkey are waiting for realistic, socialist and practical solutions to the water-energy-food and environment issues. Here, we will only try to open the subject with a few questions about our current situation in hydropower production. As I mentioned above, by transferring the "operating rights" of our hydropower dams to the private sector, we are taking away a strategically important, clean and cheap electricity production from the public administration. This practice naturally brings to mind the following simple but very important questions; 

1-What difficulties have been encountered in the operation of our hydropower dams that necessitated these transfers?

2-What strategic, national and social interests were taken into consideration when deciding to transfer the operations of hydropower dams?

3-In which area of our national energy strategy(?) was the income of 9.3 billion dollars obtained from the transfer of the operations of hydropower dams used?

4-According to the data of the General Directorate of State Hydraulic Works (DSİ), the installed capacity of hydropower electricity that Turkey can develop with social, economic and ecological sensitivities is 15 000 MW. With which financing model will this additional 15 000 MW of domestic and renewable hydropower potential be developed and how will these power plants be operated?

I know that this issue needs to be addressed in a much more comprehensive manner for a policy proposal that prioritizes our national and social interests in energy and has environmental sensitivity. My aim with the above questions was to emphasize the current situation and the lack of ownership over a very small part of this sector.