China has approved the construction of the world’s largest hydropower dam in Tibet.

The dam, which will be located in the lower reaches of the Yarlung Tsangpo river, could generate three times more energy than the Three Gorges Dam, currently the world’s largest hydropower plant.

Chinese state media has described the development as “a safe project that prioritises ecological protection”, saying it will boost local prosperity and contribute to Beijing’s climate neutrality goals.

Human rights groups and experts, however, have raised concerns about the development’s knock-on effects.Meanwhile,Tibetan protestors are on fears that the dam could displace local communities, as well as significantly alter the natural landscape and damage local ecosystems, which are among the richest and most diverse on the Tibetan Plateau.

Bejing, however, said it had relocated and compensated locals, and moved the anicent murals to safety.

Reports indicate that the colossal development would require at least four 20km-long tunnels to be drilled through the Namcha Barwa mountain, diverting the flow of the Yarlung Tsangpo, Tibet’s longest river.

Experts and officials have also flagged concerns that the dam would empower China to control or divert the flow of the trans-border river, which flows south into India’s Arunachal Pradesh and Assam states and onwards into Bangladesh.A 2020 report published by the Lowy Institute, an Australian-based think tank, noted that “control over these rivers [in the Tibetan Plateau] effectively gives China a chokehold on India’s economy”.

Shortly after China announced its plans for the Yarlung Tsangpo dam project in 2020, a senior Indian government official told that India’s government was exploring the development of a large hydropower dam and reservoir “to mitigate the adverse impact of the Chinese dam projects”.