KATHMANDU, Feb. 15 -- The permits of nine hydropower projects with a total capacity of 461 megawatts are in risk of being revoked after they failed to get approval from national parks and conservation areas to conduct feasibility study.

The national parks and conservation areas under the Ministry of Forests and Environment have denied permission for the hydropower projects from conducting feasibility studies despite those projects receiving survey licenses from the Ministry of Energy, Water Resources and Irrigation. The projects that have already paid millions of rupees in royalties face the threat of revocation of their licenses.

A team of promoters of the affected projects led by Ganesh Karki, president of the Independent Power Produc...