DoE Chief Dismisses Caspian Water Plan as a Nonentity

The plan to transfer water from the Caspian Sea to the drought-hit Semnan Province will not see the light of day in the near future, not due to ecological concerns but because it is economically unviable, head of the Department of Environment said.  
“The environmental damage which may be caused by the plan has been overrated,” Isa Kalantari told the government-owned Persian-language newspaper ‘Iran’.
If and when undertaken, the water transfer pipelines will be laid alongside a natural gas pipeline that transfers gas from Asalouyeh in Bushehr Province to the northern regions, so there are no worries about deforestation, he noted.
Not denying the fact that some trees will be felled, he argued that the environmental damage that could be inflicted by the project has been exaggerated and people have been misinformed.
Hyrcanian forests covered 3.5 million hectares in 1974. Now the area has shrunk to 1.6 million hectares.
Forests cover five provinces, stretching east to west along the southern border of the Caspian Sea, covering North Khorasan, Golestan, Mazandaran, Gilan and Ardabil provinces...