Selenga

Mongolia is planning to build up to eight hydroelectric dams on the Selenga River and its tributaries, the source of 50 percent of Lake Baikal’s surface water.

Putin said that the prospective China-funded dam on the Selenga River would cause "certain risks" to the lake in southern Siberia.

Putin said that the prospective China-funded dam on the Selenga River would cause “certain risks” to the lake in southern Siberia.

Then the pilots were to study and map the health of Baikal’s 263-square-mile Selenga River delta, home to more than 70 species of plants and animals that are threatened by Mongolian coal and gold mines situated upstream.

A few months later, I am 2,000 feet in the air, marveling at the labyrinthine channels of the wide Selenga River delta as it empties into Lake Baikal, the oldest, largest and deepest freshwater lake in the world and a particular passion of Paulsen’s.