Farmers in Thailand’s Chachoengsao province worry a planned 600-megawatt LNG power plant could increase water shortages and air pollution in an area already facing recurring drought.The project is the latest chapter in an 18-year struggle by local communities, who previously helped stop the same development when it was planned as a coal-fired power station and continue to challenge it on environmental and health grounds.Opponents also question why the plant is needed at all, arguing Thailand already has excess generating capacity and that expanding LNG infrastructure could deepen fossil-fuel dependence while delaying a shift to renewable energy.
PHANOM SARAKHAM, Thailand — On a December afternoon, Suphut Hom Chunthit and his wife were tending to their 12 durian trees. Suphut showed reporters his homemade irrigation system, a series of pipes carrying water from the nearby Yang Deng canal.
The durian trees were in their fourth year, Suphut said, so they should fruit and be ready for harvest later in 2026 — if they survive.
“Last year, we could only water the durian trees for 15 minutes a day,” said Suphut, who also grows cassava, rice, plums, rubber and rambutan in Phanom Sarakham, a district in Thailand’s Chachoengsao province. “It’s barely enough to keep them alive.”
