Thu Jan 10, 2013 5:24pm EST

n">(Reuters) - A storm moving up the Mississippi River valley will help replenish the river, low in parts from drought, and ease concerns that shipping could be halted along a shallow stretch from St. Louis to Cairo, Illinois.

Shipping groups had warned as recently as last week of an effective closure of the river along that busy stretch, through which billions of dollars of grain, coal, fertilizer and other commodities flow every year.

Rain and the brisk pace of efforts to remove underwater rock could help the Army Corps of Engineers keep barge traffic flowing through that section of the Mississippi until at least mid-February when the river's water level rises because of seasonal changes.

The U.S. Coast Guard on Thursday relaxed their previously rigid draft restrictions for vessels transiting the area in response to the improved river forecast.

Boats had been required to have a draft of, at most, nine feet between the water's surface and the lowest point of the vessel. Now, while still recommending nine-foot drafts, the Coast Guard will allow deeper-draft boats if conditions allow.

Most barge tow boats require a draft of at least nine feet.

"The forecasts are looking good," said Lt. Colin Fogarty, public affairs officer for the Coast Guard's upper Mississippi River sector that covers the Cairo area and northward.

Shippers are still watching river gauges along the waterway to make sure they can transit low water areas.

"It doesn't look like we're going to hit those two thresholds of a minus-six feet in St. Louis and plus-two feet in Thebes," Fogarty said on Thursday, referring to low river gauge readings at the two locations that would prompt the Coast Guard to restrict vessel drafts to less than nine feet.

Gauge readings do not reflect the actual depth of the river at a certain location because the gauges are fixed and the river's bottom steadily changes with the current. They aid navigation as a shorter term reference point.

The river gauge at St. Louis was expected to rise from -2.8 feet on Thursday to -1 foot by Sunday, according to the National Weather Service.

At Thebes, Illinois, where the Army Corps has been removing rock pinnacles since mid-December, the gauge was at 3.8 feet on Thursday and expected to rise to 8.2 feet by Tuesday.

Rock clearing at Thebes and another location near Grand Tower, Illinois, was expected to be completed by the end of January, allowing for two additional feet of draft.

The prioritized removal of the most threatening pinnacles at Thebes is expected to be completed later this week, a Corps spokesman said late on Wednesday.

"Basically, the crisis is over. No, we can't run the 12-foot drafts that we would like to run out of St. Louis with 14-foot barges, but we'll have enough water that barges can continue to move," a grain barge trader said.

(Reporting by Karl Plume in Chicago; Editing by Toni Reinhold)

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CHICAGO | Wed Dec 26, 2012 7:55pm EST

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Commerce on a key stretch of the Mississippi River could "come to an effective halt" earlier than expected next week due to low water levels, disrupting shipments of billions of dollars of grain and other goods, a group of shippers said on Wednesday.

The Waterways Council, which represents shippers and receivers of commodities, said in a message to its members that it received an advisory from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers on Monday that indicated water levels around Thebes, Ill., could be too low for most vessels to operate by January 3 or 4.

A spokesman for the Army Corps did not immediately return a call for comment about the forecast.

Shippers for months have been watching the stretch of the Mississippi River between St. Louis and Cairo, Ill., which includes Thebes, due to concerns about a potential closure.

A shipping superhighway that carries billions of dollars in grain, coal, steel and other commodities every year from the central United States to the Gulf of Mexico, the Mississippi is near record-low levels due to the worst U.S. drought since 1956.

"Water levels are falling quicker than we anticipated," Ann McCulloch, spokeswoman for the American Waterways Operators, a sister organization to the Waterways Council, said in an interview. "We were hoping not to reach this point until mid January."

The Waterways Council did not specify how long the river could be effectively closed.

Shippers have said previously that rain is needed to replenish water levels to keep the river open.

Recent snowfall in the central United States should help increase water levels on the lower Mississippi River, said Army Corps spokesman Mike Petersen earlier on Wednesday. However, "we would need a lot more" precipitation to see a significant improvement on key stretches of the middle Mississippi near Thebes, he said.

The Mississippi River is the main shipping waterway for grain moving from Midwest farms to export facilities at the Gulf of Mexico. Some 55 to 65 percent of U.S. corn, soybean and wheat shipments exit the country via the Gulf.

Exporters stepped up shipments of grain and soybeans to the Gulf Coast before water levels fell to critically low levels, forcing barges to take on lighter loads. They also resorted to loading more of their goods on rail cars.

The disruption of river traffic due to low water has pushed up export prices for grain, especially soybeans that are in strong demand from buyers like China.

ORDERS CANCELED, ORDERS CURTAILED

The latest forecast calls for the Mississippi River gauge at Thebes, to be at 3 feet on or around January 3-4, with vessel drafts limited to 8 feet, according the Waterways Council. The majority of vessels require a 9-foot draft to operate.

The draft is the distance from the surface of the water to a boat's lowest point.

"Our members have been preparing (for an effective closure) by investigating other options to move their products, either by rail or truck," said Debra Colbert, senior vice president for the council. "We've seen orders canceled; we've seen orders curtailed. We've seen companies looking at potential layoffs."

The Army Corps last week began clearing rocks from a shallow stretch of the drought-hit river near Thebes to maintain the flow of goods to Gulf Coast ports.

The low water level on the Mississippi River after this year's devastating dry spell was exacerbated by the Corps' decision to reduce by even more than usual the amount of water that flows into the waterway from the Missouri River. The Corps reduces the Missouri River flow every autumn.

The move raised protests from Midwestern governors and senators who urged President Barack Obama to rescind the decision for fear that badly needed income would be lost through the disruption of commerce that flows through the river.

The river groups met last week with White House staff "and continue to implore them and members of Congress and the Corps to release additional water to sustain navigation on the Mississippi River," the Council said.

(Reporting By Tom Polansek; Editing by Diane Craft)

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n">(Reuters) - A tanker carrying light crude oil down the Hudson River briefly ran aground south of Albany, New York, but showed no evidence of a spill, the Coast Guard said on Thursday.

The Stena Primorsk, a 600-foot (182-metre) motor tanker, lost control of its steering on Thursday morning and hit land near Stuyvesant, New York, about 20 miles downriver from Albany, the Coast Guard said. The vessel was later at anchor.

There was no evidence of pollution from the crash, though emergency responders were sent to the site to investigate, the Coast Guard said.

Oil market sources said the vessel was carrying light shale crude from the Bakken prospect in North Dakota destined for a Canadian refinery.

(Reporting by Peter Rudegeair and Selam Gebrekidan; Editing by Nick Zieminski)

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As the silver waters of the Kishanganga rush through this north Kashmir valley, Indian labourers are hard at work on a hydropower project that will dam the river just before it flows across one of the world’s most militarised borders into Pakistan.

The loud hum of excavators echoes through the pine-covered valley, clearing masses of soil and boulders.

The 330-MW dam shows India’s growing focus on hydropower but also highlights how water is a growing source of tension with downstream Pakistan, which depends on the snow-fed Himalayan rivers for everything from drinking water to agriculture.

Islamabad has complained to an international court that the dam in the Gurez valley, one of dozens planned by India, will affect river flows and is illegal. The court has halted any permanent work on the river for the moment, although India can still continue tunneling and other associated projects.

In the years since their partition from British India in 1947, land disputes have led the two nuclear-armed neighbours to two of their three wars. The next flashpoint could well be water.

“There is definitely potential for conflict based on water, particularly if we are looking to the year 2050, when there could be considerable water scarcity in India and Pakistan,” says Michael Kugelman, South Asia Associate at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington.

“Populations will continue to grow. There will be more pressure on supply. Factor in climate change and faster glacial melt … That means much more will be at stake. So you could have a perfect storm which conceivably could be some sort of trigger.”

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It’s not just South Asia — water disputes are a global phenomenon, sparked by growing populations, rapid urbanisation, increased irrigation and a rising demand for alternative power such as hydroelectricity.

Turkey, Syria, Iran and Iraq quarrel over the waters of the Tigris and Euphrates. The Jordan river divides Israel, Jordan, Lebanon and the West Bank, while 10 African countries begrudgingly share the Nile.

In Southeast Asia, China and Laos are building dams over the mighty Mekong, raising tensions with downstream nations.

A U.S. intelligence report in February warned fresh water supplies are unlikely to keep up with global demand by 2040, increasing political instability, hobbling economic growth and endangering world food markets.

A “water war” is unlikely in the next decade, it said, but beyond that rising demand and scarcities due to climate change and poor management will increase the risk of conflict.

MAJOR THREAT

That threat is possibly nowhere more apparent than in South Asia, home to a fifth of humanity and rife with historical tensions, mistrust and regional rivalries.

The region’s three major river systems – the Indus, the Ganges and the Brahmaputra – sustain India and Pakistan’s breadbasket states and many of their major cities including New Delhi and Islamabad, as well as Bangladesh.

“South Asia is symbolic of what we are seeing in terms of water stress and tensions across the world,” says B.G. Verghese, author and analyst at New Delhi’s Centre for Policy Research.

The region is one of the world’s most water-stressed, yet the population is adding an extra 25 million people a year – South Asia’s per capita water availability has dropped by 70 percent since 1950, says the Asian Development Bank.

The effect of climate change on glaciers and rainfall patterns may be crucial.

“Most of the water that is used in Pakistan comes from glacial melt or the monsoon,” says Rafay Alam, an environmental lawyer and coordinator of the water programme at Lahore University of Management Sciences.

The dry months of June-July offer a snapshot of the extreme water crisis in the region.

Hospitals in New Delhi this year cancelled surgeries because they had no water to sterilse instruments, clean operating theatres or even wash hands. Swanky malls selling luxury brands were forced to switch off air conditioners and shut toilets.

In Pakistan, the port town of Gwadar ran out of water entirely, forcing the government to send two naval water tankers. Some government flats in the garrison city of Rawalpindi have not had water for weeks, said the local press.

India, as both an upper and lower riparian nation, finds itself at the centre of water disputes with its eastern and western downstream neighbours — Bangladesh and Pakistan — which accuse New Delhi of monopolising water flows.

To the north and northeast, India fears the same of upstream China, with which it fought a brief border war in 1962. Beijing plans a series of dams over the Tsangpo river, called the Brahmaputra as it flows into eastern India.

DAM DISPUTES

For India, damming its Himalayan rivers is key to generating electricity, as well as managing irrigation and flood control. Hydropower is a critical part of India’s energy security strategy and New Delhi plans to use it to reach about 40 percent of people who are currently off the grid.

A severe power shortage is hitting factory output and rolling outages are routine, further stifling an economy which is growing at its slowest in years.

India’s plans have also riled Bangladesh, which it helped gain freedom from Pakistan in 1971. Relations cooled partly over the construction of the Farakka Barrage (dam) on the Ganges River which Dhaka complained to the United Nations about in 1976. The issue remains a sore point even now.

More recently, Bangladesh has opposed India’s plans to dam the Teesta and Barak rivers in its remote northeast.

But India’s hydropower plans are most worrying for Pakistan.

Water has long been a source of stress between the two countries. The line that divided them in 1947 also cleaved the province of Punjab, literally the land of five rivers – the Sutlej, Beas, Ravi, Chenab and Jhelum, all tributaries of the Indus – breaking up millenniums-old irrigation systems.

India’s latest hydro plans have fanned new tensions.

“Pakistan is extremely worried that India is planning to build a whole sequence of projects on both the Chenab and Jhelum rivers … and the extent to which India then becomes capable of controlling water flows,” says Feisal Naqvi, a lawyer who works on water issues.

In recent years, political rhetoric over water has been on the rise in Islamabad, and militant groups such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba have sought to use the issue to whip up anti-India sentiments – accusing New Delhi of “stealing water”.

India brushes off such fears as paranoia and argues the dams  won’t consume or store water but just delay flows, in line with a 1960 treaty that governs the sharing of Indus waters between the two countries.

SINK OR SWIM

South Asia’s water woes may have little to do with cross-border disputes, however. Shortages appear to be rooted in  wasteful and inefficient water management practices, with India and Pakistan the worst culprits, experts say.

“All these countries are badly managing their water resources, yet they are experts in blaming other countries outside,” says Sundeep Waslekar, president of Strategic Foresight Group, a Mumbai-based think-tank.

“It would be more constructive if they looked at what they are doing at home, than across their borders.”

Their water infrastructure systems, such as canals and pipes used to irrigate farm lands, are falling apart from neglect. Millions of gallons of water are lost to leakages every day.

The strain on groundwater is the most disturbing. In India, more than 60 percent of irrigated agriculture and 85 percent of drinking water depend on it, says the World Bank. Yet in 20 years, most of its aquifers will be in a critical condition.

Countries must improve water management, say experts, and share information such as river flows as well as joint ventures on dam projects such as those India is doing with Bhutan.

“Populations are growing, demand is increasing, climate change is taking its toll and we are getting into deeper and deeper waters,” says Verghese, author of ‘Waters of Hope: Himalayan-Ganga cooperation for a billion people’.

“You can’t wait and watch. You have to get savvy and do something about it. Why get locked into rhetoric? We need to cooperate. Unless you learn to swim, you are dead.”

This blog is part of AlertNet’s “The Battle for Water” multimedia report. Find out more here.

(Additional reporting by Rebecca Conway and Qasim Nauman in Islamabad and Sheikh Mustaq in Srinagar; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan and Sonya Hepinstall)

Picture credit: Engineers and workers work at the tunnels of Kishanganga power project in Gurez, 160 km (99 miles) north of Srinagar, Indian-administered Kashmir, June 21, 2012. REUTERS/Fayaz Kabli

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