The Sayano-Shushensky State Natural Biosphere Reserve is a nature
reserve in an inaccessible area of the Western Sayan in the south
of the Krasnoyarsk Territory on the left bank of the Yenisei River
in the zone of influence of the Sayano-Shushensky reservoir.
The area is 3904 km². The relief is mountainous, with heights from
500 to 2735 m.
Studies the impact of the reservoir on the
natural community. The main protected species is the snow leopard.
The fauna of the reserve is extremely diverse, almost 100 species
are rare, endangered and included in the Red Book. Most of the
reserve is occupied by forests. The main value is Siberian cedar.
The area of cedar forests exceeds 1000 km². It is part of the
Association of Nature Reserves and National Parks of the Altai-Sayan
Ecoregion.
The
Sayano-Shushenskaya HPP was designed since 1961, construction began
in 1966, and the Yenisei was closed in 1975. But back in 1967, the
first publications appeared about the need to create a nature
reserve in the area of the future reservoir: in order to be able
to study what was, what will be in the future and what really is. In
1976 the reserve was organized. It was an ordinary nature reserve in
the Glavokhota system. Thanks to its timely creation, the staff of
the reserve managed to collect a "cut" of information from those
areas that were subsequently flooded.
Any reservoir is a big
enough load on the ecosystem. And such loads, of course, must be
calculated in advance, and accordingly some compensation measures
must be taken in advance. Moreover, they must be absolutely adequate
- only in this case, the damage that any hydroelectric power plant
brings to the environment will be minimal.
The reserve was
immediately created as one of the compensatory measures during the
construction of the hydroelectric power station. The reserve was
faced with the task of preserving the ecosystem in the state in
which it was at the time the reserve was created. Due to its
inaccessibility in those years, there were no poachers or loggers on
the territory of the reserve. It was located on an area of almost
a million hectares, but geologists opposed this, who discovered
significant deposits of asbestos, which were planned to be used in
the future. Therefore, the reserve has occupied its current area of
400 thousand hectares. Since 1978, research has begun on all
aspects - flora and fauna, geology, snow cover, water, etc. have
been studied.
Since 1985, the reserve has been assigned the
status of a biosphere, that is, it has been included in the UNESCO
system of international reserves. According to its new status,
research began to be complex. If nitrogen, pesticides and some other
indicators are not recorded in an ordinary reserve, now, after the
construction of a special station for integrated background
monitoring, they began to monitor almost all environmental
parameters. Vegetation cover analyzes were carried out on a regular
basis, snow samples were taken, which were processed in the
departments of the Hydrometeorological Center of Khakassia and
Novosibirsk.
The state of the territory at the time of
filling the reservoir
When the reservoir was filled, 1.2% of the
territory of the existing reserve was flooded. This is the territory
that is released every year by the spring, when the reservoir is
depleted by 40 m.
Initially, the “pressure” on nature from
the creation of the reservoir was simply colossal, because
everything that lived on this narrow strip of coast disappeared.
Such coastal species of animals as the badger and the fox simply
could not adapt to such a regime. The mud was impassable - the
animals practically did not approach the water. The vegetation has
completely disappeared. All this lasted for about 4-5 years. Plants
were the first to settle down, and now this strip is like a green
oasis, that is, it instantly overgrows in spring. Moreover, all
silty deposits and overlays have stabilized. Landslide processes are
also almost imperceptible - everything that could have slipped slid
down immediately. And now the flooded strip is the food base for
animals.
What happened next
Predators were the first to
adapt. In particular, the wolf got used to it instantly. And about
10-12 years old ungulates have mastered. Now they are making the
same traditional transitions that they did before the reservoir
appeared. That is, the fears of scientists that the ibex population,
which is considered rare, will be torn apart, turned out to be in
vain.
Of course, with the advent of hydroelectric power
plants, nature has changed. It has become warmer, the flora has
changed along the banks. Some species of plants and animals have
disappeared, but species associated with humans have become more
common. A mass wintering of birds has arisen - now up to 10 thousand
ducks winter on the non-freezing Yenisei. And, besides, the
hydrological regime has changed, that is, the annual floods have
stopped.
Due to the increase in humidity and climate
warming, the growing season has become almost a month longer. The
staff of the reserve uses such a method of observation as
photographing the same area from one point. The compared photographs
clearly show how the vegetation changed, eventually becoming
completely different. The dry steppe slopes of the mountains are now
intensively overgrown. The water in the reservoir has become much
cleaner. According to analyzes, it in its natural state can already
be used as drinking. According to this indicator, the Yenisei below
the hydroelectric power station is perfect for fish farming. In the
Sayano-Shushensky reservoir itself, cryogenic, that is, those that
dominated earlier, types of fish have practically disappeared:
grayling, taimen, lenok. However, in all the tributaries, in which
the grayling was previously found, it recovered in the same volume.
Lenok also recovered. The situation with the taimen is somewhat more
complicated: a lot of juvenile taimen are caught, however, there are
fewer large individuals so far. But new types of fish have appeared.
Taking into account the total biomass, the fish stocks are now
larger. Since 2006, the Sayano-Shushenskoye reservoir has been
included in the list of fishing farms.
Expansion of the
reserve
In 1994, by a decree of the Krasnoyarsk Territory
administration, an additional protection zone was created - another
102 thousand hectares. An access control was introduced with the
right of the director of the reserve by his order to completely
terminate access when necessary. By 2000, a biosphere polygon
project was developed, and for another 591 thousand hectares,
according to which a biosphere polygon was created by the decision
of the Administration and the order of the State Committee for
Environmental Protection.
According to its status, the
landfill includes:
directly reserved territory, which is the core
of tourism, hunting, extraction of natural resources;
transition
zone where you can already do business, but with a special permit;
a zone of cooperation, where traditional types of human use of
nature develop, hunting, logging, etc.
Participation in the
environmental work of the Sayano-Shushenskaya HPP
First of all, as a subject that generates a
problem, OJSC “Sayano-Shushenskaya HPP named after PS Neporozhny”
participates in this work, which financed the monitoring. In the
period from 1994 to 1997, when there was a “perestroika” collapse in
the country, the Sayano-Shushenskaya HPP covered half of all the
utility costs of the reserve, and the Minusinskaya CHPP took the
other half. In 1993, a document was developed called "Program of
monitoring studies in the zone of influence of the SSHHPP",
according to which an annual comprehensive report-research on the
impact of hydroelectric power plants on the region's ecology is
prepared.
Snow leopard population
Twelve snow leopards
currently live in the Sayano-Shushensky Biosphere Reserve. The snow
leopard population has stabilized over the past few years.