Many players have supported infrastructure development in the Mekong Subregion, bridging the missing links in Southeast Asia. While the influx of energy-related infrastructure development investments to the region has improved the livelihoods of millions of people on the one hand, it has brought about a myriad of challenges to the wider region in guiding investments for quality infrastructure and for promoting a low-carbon economy, and energy access and affordability, on the other hand. Besides reviewing key regional initiatives for infrastructure investment and development, this paper examines energy demand and supply, and forecasts energy consumption in the subregion during 2017–2050 using energy modeling scenario analysis. The study found that to satisfy growing energy demand in the subregion, huge power generation infrastructure investment, estimated at around USD 190 billion–220 billion, is necessary between 2017 and 2050 and that such an investment will need to be guided by appropriate policy. We argue that without redesigning energy policy towards high-quality energy infrastructure, it is very likely that the increasing use of coal upon which the region greatly depends will lead to the widespread construction of coal-fired power plants, which could result in increased greenhouse gas and carbon dioxide emissions.

Susanne Schmeier’s Governing International Watercourses: River Basin Organizations and the Sustainable Governance of Internationally Shared Rivers and Lakes (2013) is a monograph that offers a systematic and comparative analysis of River Basin Organizations (RBOs) and their role in transboundary water governance. The 344-page book is structured into three main parts. Part I develops the theoretical foundations of international river basin governance, Part II presents a global empirical assessment of RBOs, and Part III examines three in-depth case studies: the Mekong, the Danube, and the Senegal River basins. Across these sections, the book advances seven core propositions concerning the institutional determinants of effective basin governance. Grounded in a neo-institutionalist perspective, the book argues that institutional design plays a decisive role in shaping the performance of RBOs. Schmeier challenges deterministic explanations that attribute governance outcomes primarily to hydrology, geography, or power asymmetries, and instead emphasizes the importance of legal mandates, organizational structures, procedural instruments, and financial arrangements in enabling collective action among riparian states.