1. 9 FEATURES
Bangkok Post THURSDAY, AUGUST 11, 2011 LIFE
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EARTHALERT  PATARAPHAND CHIRATHIVAT
Small ways to
reduce flooding
A bicycle trip helps students understand how
unchecked land use has aggravated flood problems
A file photo shows
the Royal Plaza
under water in 1942.
Wet weather didn’t deter the students from exploring
the roots of the capital’s flooding problem.
On top of The Golden Mount.
A brief lecture before embarking on the trip.
PHOTOS:PATARAPHANDCHIRATHIVAT
U
ndaunted by a heavy
downpour during the
morning rush hour that
brought the city’s traffic
to a standstill, a group
of students were ready for their unusual
journey — a bicycle trip.
The group, grade 9 students from
Roong-Aroon High School in Samut
Prakan province, organised this one-
day trip, covering 20 kilometres from
Rama VIII Bridge to Lumpini Park. The
aim was to learn about flood problems
in Bangkok.
Their interest in the flood issue was
triggered by the fact that their school,
which is only 5 kilometres from Samut
Prakan’s coast, has been threatened
byflooding,followingreportsbyanum-
ber of agencies such as the World Bank
thatThailand willface seriousflooding
by 2020. The Pheu Thai government’s
policy to reclaim land in the inner Gulf
ofThailandandbuildadamhascaused
concern as it will rip through an area of
mangrove forests — a major natural
protection against soil erosion.
This week the school held a seminar
on town planning and land use with
the aim to raise awareness among stu-
dents, parents and surrounding com-
munities about potential environmental
problems, should the new government
go ahead with the land reclamation
project.
The bicycle trip is a part of the cam-
paign to help students understand how
unchecked land use has aggravated the
capital’s problems in flood-prone areas.
From the starting point at Rama VIII
Bridge, 25 students in five groups ped-
alled to the first stop, the National
Museum Bangkok.
They did not go into the museum.
Instead, they headed to a pillar marking
the water level when the city faced its
worst flood in 1942, with the water
level reaching 37.5 centimetres. During
that year, the whole of Sanam Luang
and a number of nearby roads were
under water.
It turned out to be geographic ex-
pedition into the history of flooding in
Bangkok.TheirnextstopwastheGolden
Mount, or ‘‘Phu Kao Thong’’, where
the students met up with their geog-
raphy teacher, Nom Ngamnisai, who
briefed them about the development
of the city’s streets.
Boastingnumerouscanalsinthepast,
Bangkok used to be known as ‘‘the
Venice of the East’’. A canal by the
GoldenMount isone ofthe fewexisting
reminders of this.
According to Nom, ‘‘the Venice of
the East’’ was transformed when more
streets were built to accommodate
motor cars.
‘‘During the reign of King Rama V,
westartedtobuildCharoenKrungRoad
before extending to other important
roadslikeRamaIV.WhenBangkokstart-
ed to have roads, city dwellers changed
their mode of transport, from boats in
small canals to cars on the new roads,’’
he said.
Cars were then imported into the
country from America and Europe dur-
ing the era of King Rama IV.
‘‘By then fewer and fewer people
usedboats,whilemoreandmorepeople
turned to cars. This changing trend
encouraged policymakers at the time
to fill in the khlongs to make ways for
more roads and before we knew it the
Venice of the East was gone,’’ Nom
added.
Filled-upcanalsaffectednaturalflood
water drainage in Bangkok. In the past,
the Venice of the East — the city with
canals zigzagging along the area — was
appropriate to the geographic setting
ofBangkok:low-lyinglandwithseasonal
flooding. Road development and the
disappearance of canals reduced water
draining capacity to only 40%, according
to statistics from the Royal Irrigation
Department (RID).
‘‘Besides, Bangkok is not an ideal
place to be developed as a big city
because the land is only one metre
above sea level,’’ Nom said.
Over 200 years ago Sanam Luang
was a rice paddy field, with seasonal
flooding.KhlongLotwasoncecrowded
with boats as people travelled by boat;
their homes facing up canals and back
of the house was small road alley.
After a stop at Talad Bobae, students
headedforBanKrua,anoldcommunity
by the canal and one of the few tradi-
tional communities remaining in Bang-
kok. Dating back to the the early
Rattanakosin period, the community
was consolidated in a fight against an
expressway construction project that
would force them to leave.
At Ban Krua Community, students
learned about the life of a traditional
community by the canal. They also
learned about the function of flood
gates which help eased flood problem
for this old community.
The trip was an eye-opening experi-
ence for the students.
Student Phuwit Supanwong express-
ed concern about flooding as the loss
of natural canals has reduced the drain-
age capacity, and the areas are subject
to more floods. He said he also worried
about the future of communities along
Samut Prakan’s coastal areas.
At Roong-Aroon School, students
have been taught that mangrove forests
protected the land against sea water.
Now, students have started asking ques-
tions about what will happen to the
land if the sea and mangrove forests
are filled up.
‘‘Some Thai people think mangrove
forests are ugly, so they just fill them in
and make a beautiful beach next to the
sea and I just can’t believe that is a
valid reason to fill the land in one of
the most precious and richest areas.’’
Another student, Apisit Pansukij, is
also worried about the future. ‘‘Land
filling around Samut Prakan and Samut
Sakhon does not make any sense
because it will definitely only cause
things to get worse. If the government
is sincere and really wants to tackle
flooding, it should find some other ways
that will not disturb these natural pro-
tection areas.’’
ThenextstopwasSiamSquare,where
students compared modern areas and
old Ban Krua community just a few
kilometres away. The students were
told that in the old days Siam Square
was also a rice paddy field with seasonal
floods.
Then they pedalled along the road
to Ratchaprasong, one of the city’s most
congested spots. Nom linked the use
of cars and air conditioners, and more
rain in Bangkok.
‘‘ThewayBangkokhasgrown,trans-
forming rice-planting land into a con-
crete jungle, has had a lot of conse-
quences,’’ said Nom.’’
With so many heat-absorbing con-
crete buildings, Bangkok has become
a heat island.
‘‘Air conditioners have become in-
dispensable but they also contribute
more heat. Besides, most students today
do not know much about the natural
environment, so they should start to
learn how to live without air condi-
tioning.’’
The teacher also encouraged his stu-
dents to adjust their lifestyles, such as
using cotton bags rather than plastic
ones and electric fans instead of air
conditioners.
Finally,thestudentsatLumpiniPark.
They were tired, but they had had fun.
Phuwit said he felt good about the
trip.
‘‘Today we were able to see many
angles of Bangkok which we never en-
countered before in our life and it is
time for us to make a change,’’ said the
student, a resident of Samut Prakan
who regularly uses a bicycle.
He told his group: ‘‘If 25 of us had
used cars instead of bicycles on this
trip it would have added 100 kilos of
carbon dioxide to the atmosphere.
‘‘In making the trip, we’ve already
made a change and if more people are
willing to embrace bicycles as their
transportation, Bangkok could be a
cleaner and cooler city — perhaps one
smallwaytoreducefloodsinthefuture.’’
ENERGY
AURELIA END Getting rid of a
nuclear plant, one
rivet at a time
I
nGermany,whereallnuclearpower
reactors are to close by 2022, clean-
up work at one such plant still con-
tinues after 15 years, a sign of how long
a real end to the atomic age here will
take.
The Lubmin plant on the Baltic coast
was home to five of East Germany’s six
nuclear reactors and supplied 10% of
the communist country’s electricity when
it was taken off the grid in 1990 following
German reunification.
‘‘It was Russian technology, but it
wasn’t the same model as Chernobyl,’’
the Ukrainian power plant responsible
for the world’s worst nuclear disaster, in
1986, says Marlies Philipp, the former
plant’s spokeswoman.
The site was mothballed for a few
years before work began on dismantling
it in 1995.
Decontamination work has been going
on ever since at a cost to date of 4.1
billion euros ($5.8 billion), a sum which
does not include the actual demolition
of the buildings.
‘‘We don’t have money for that,’’ says
Philipp, who used to work as an engineer.
Of the 5,500 staff employed there at
the time of the fall of the Berlin Wall in
1989, 830 have managed to stay on to
work on decommissioning and decon-
tamination.
Work at the plant is expected to con-
tinue until 2013 or 2014.
At first it was ‘‘learning by doing,’’ she
says but experience now means ‘‘we can
hope to win contracts for decommiss-
ioning plants in the west’’ when they too
are taken off the power grid.
Chancellor Angela Merkel’s govern-
ment decided in the wake of the disaster
at the Fukushima plant in Japan in March
to shutter all 17 of Germany’s nuclear
reactors within 11 years.
Visitors allowed into the decontami-
nation workshop at Lubmin must wear
radioactivity detectors and change into
special protective clothing.
Working from inside containers,
equipped with portholes, employees use
high-pressure water, abrasive dust jets
and acid baths to decontaminate the
rooms one at a time.
‘‘Don’t think radioactivity just disap-
pears. It stays there as ground dust which
has to be disposed of,’’ says Uwe Kopp,
in charge of one of the workshops.
Once decontaminated, machinery
parts are piled into boxes to await a final
radioactivity control before being sent
for recycling or disposal.
‘‘You can’t undo a single rivet without
havingtofilloutadocumentintriplicate,’’
says Philipp.
‘‘Everything is done to remind us that
we are dealing with dangerous material,’’
adds Kopp.
In addition to radioactivity checks,
workers must go through metal detectors
and their work site is surrounded by
cameras and protected by guards with
dogs.
Contaminated material from the plant
is held in dozen of containers and barrels,
awaiting a final government decision on
a site for long-term storage.
The end of the nuclear era in Lubmin
forced the town to look in new directions,
and it has tapped into the growing re-
newable energy sector, in particular wind
power.
OneofthetwoNorthStreamgaspipe-
lines, which is due to start pumping gas
from Russia by way of the Baltic Sea by
the end of the year, also runs through its
backyard and promises to pick up some
of the slack in supply left by the nuclear
phaseout.
The nuclear site was shut down ‘‘for
economic and political reasons,’’ says
Philipp.
‘‘We were proud of our plant,’’ she
adds.
‘‘Today it’s our colleagues in the west
who must feel the same way. It’s their
turn now.’’ AFP