Troubled Waters: The Case Against Hydroelectric Power

Once a symbol of human ingenuity and power over nature, the 79,000 dams scattered across America’s landscape are now falling into disrepair and disuse. Even the larger, highly functioning dams struggle to generate enough energy to justify their drawbacks. This decline is merely the latest chapter in the fraught history of hydroelectricity — a tale that includes unintended environmental consequences and disregard for Native American rights. Repairing the damages done by dams and reservoirs across the country is no easy feat, but as we look forward to a future of greener energy, we must examine the true power (or lack thereof) that dams provide. With such serious environmental and sociopolitical baggage, it’s a dubious claim that hydropower really is a “clean” source of energy.

The Klamath River, which runs from southern Oregon to the Pacific Ocean through northern California, is the battleground of the most recent conflict over water rights. In early February, both state as well as federal officials announced that they plan to level four hydroelectric dams along the river. The deconstruction had previously stalled due to contention over water-sharing agreements between farmers and Native American tribes. Both sides wanted to move forward with projects to restore the river’s ecosystems, but the farmers wanted to ensure that this habitat restoration didn’t affect their supply of water and energy in the Klamath River Basin. Ultimately, they couldn’t satisfy everyone, and the final agreement provided for the destruction of four of the river’s dams. This provision is something the farmers, who rely on the reservoirs for energy and water supply, continue to resist. The decision to proceed with the demolition of the four dams, despite the absence of consensus, reveals how sensitive and divisive hydroelectric power can be. It demands a delicate — or sometimes impossible — balancing act between agricultural, local, state, federal, and Native American parties.

But farmers are not the only group that can lose out in these negotiations. In fact, the U.S. government has a long history of exploiting, displacing, and disenfranchising Native Americans to benefit other parties. In countless other instances around the country, Native American tribes have suffered greatly from the seemingly unstoppable side effects of hydroelectric development. From the Cree of northern Quebec, whose lands were bought out and flooded by Hydro-Quebec in the early 1970s with little consent or input from the native community, to the Lower Elwha Klallam people in Olympia National Park in Washington, whose spiritual connection to the Elwha River and its salmon was decimated by the construction of the Elwha Dam, the push for hydropower has held little regard for the rights of Native Americans. While area tribes in the Klamath River Basin hold senior water rights, giving them primary authority over the siphoning and use of the river, that is an authority that few other tribes around the country can claim.

Of course, hydropower is not without its apologists. Many people point to its lower carbon footprint as a source of energy, particularly for more rural areas of the country. However, this benefit must be weighed against the damaging ecological impacts of dams and reservoirs which, when coupled with their impact on already struggling Native groups, makes hydropower an unappealing source of green energy. Dams primarily damage river ecosystems through local fragmentation caused by the physical barrier of the dam. This division of the river leads to decreased stability within the area’s habitats and makes these habitats incredibly vulnerable to minor changes in climate or resource availability. This is because small fragments of ecosystems can only support small populations of plants and animals, and, in turn, small populations are much more susceptible to change than larger, unfragmented ecosystems are. Therefore introduction of pollutants or disease into a fragmented river can be catastrophic to food webs. Larger ecosystems are better equipped to re-stabilize after these changes and return to a sustainable equilibrium.

Dams also impact the water quality of the river. Reservoir water is also often oxygen-poor and colder than the other water in the river. If the reserve water is released into rest of the river through leaks in the dam or flooding, it can dramatically alter the habitability of the river ecosystem for many vital species, including fish populations. But even without an unintentional release of reservoir water, fish can still be harmed:  Dams make it physically impossible for fish, trout, and other migratory river animals to move about the river as they naturally would, while interfering with reproduction and generally threatening an already-dwindling population of freshwater river fish.

Finally by blocking of the natural flow of river, dams generate sediment build-up in the reservoir. This sediment build-up is perhaps the most threatening of the ecological damages done by hydropower, as the build-up gradually decreases the amount of water able to be held by the reservoir, ultimately leading to a reduced ability to produce hydroelectric power and the eventual expiration — due to increasingly shallow, warmer waters — of both the dam and the river.

While we have yet to discover a source of renewable energy that is without any flaws and presents no inconvenience to humans (and it’s likely that we won’t for the foreseeable future), there are many energy alternatives that have proven to be less intrusive to human populations and far less damaging to local ecosystems than hydropower. Both solar and wind power have enormous potential to supply energy to increasingly large communities, while posing relatively little threat (aside from being a bit of an eyesore) to either human or ecological populations. As these technologies, among others, develop further to overcome their respective drawbacks, they will be the standard for clean energy that hydropower has yet to meet.

Dams across the country are falling into disrepair, giving way to the power of the rivers they’ve been harnessing. As nature slowly claims these smaller victories, the United States should be looking into a more proactive approach of demolishing dams and rehabilitating the ecosystems and communities that have been drowning under man-made reservoirs. The spectacular increase in the innovation of renewable-energy technology in recent years has created alternative energy possibilities that are more efficient, more sustainable, and far less intrusive than hydropower. Rather than continuing to rely upon outdated and exploitive hydro technology, society should retire this relic to history.