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(disclaimer: I work in a climate&energy R&D lab) > since hydropower production emits no greenhouse gas emissions. ... that is incorrect. Hydro reservoirs emit

(disclaimer: I work in a climate&energy R&D lab) > since hydropower production emits no greenhouse gas emissions. ... that is incorrect. Hydro reservoirs emit a fair bit of CO2 and CH4, especially cold northern lakes with large surface area [1] that have inundated a fair bit of biomass. The emissions can be mitigated, but there is no economic incentive to do so, so it doesn't happen. The total is generally far less than, say, the CCGT equivalent, but not always. The cost is not strictly proportional to the power output, so it's usually counted a sunk cost... :) [1] https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article/66/11/949/2754271 https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article/66/11/949/275427... - see supplemental data

908B64B197 5y ago
> Funding was provided by the Hundred Talent Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC 31670473) [...] the CNPq/Brazil fellowship 202937/2014-3 to Bezerra-Neto Interesting that financing for this research came from the country building the most new coal plants right now, and on an out of control trajectory for emissions. The other one, of course, has the president that think it's ok to cut down the Amazonian rainforest. Both of them have a pretty good reason to discredit hydro.
- sudosysgen 5y ago
  What? China loves hydro. They're building the most hydro in the world. They have the largest hydroelectric dam in the world (built with the help of Hydro Quebec btw, though the Federal government didn't like that iirc)
  - 908B64B197 5y ago
    China's emissions are going up at an alarming rate despite them building out Hydro, thanks to their addiction to coal. [0] - a 7x increase per capita since 1973 (+532%) - 48% increase for its global emissions since 2007 It's in their interest to make Hydro not look so great so they can claim that the west isn't much cleaner than they are. [0] https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china

908B64B197 5y ago

> Funding was provided by the Hundred Talent Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC 31670473) [...] the CNPq/Brazil fellowship 202937/2014-3 to Bezerra-Neto Interesting that financing for this research came from the country building the most new coal plants right now, and on an out of control trajectory for emissions. The other one, of course, has the president that think it's ok to cut down the Amazonian rainforest. Both of them have a pretty good reason to discredit hydro.

sudosysgen 5y ago
What? China loves hydro. They're building the most hydro in the world. They have the largest hydroelectric dam in the world (built with the help of Hydro Quebec btw, though the Federal government didn't like that iirc)
- 908B64B197 5y ago
  China's emissions are going up at an alarming rate despite them building out Hydro, thanks to their addiction to coal. [0] - a 7x increase per capita since 1973 (+532%) - 48% increase for its global emissions since 2007 It's in their interest to make Hydro not look so great so they can claim that the west isn't much cleaner than they are. [0] https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china https://ourworldindata.org/co2/country/china