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And how many more kilotons of fossil fuels would we need to burn per year to make up for the loss in hydroelectric power those dams give us?

melling 5y ago
We are using record amounts of coal globally. https://www.wsj.com/articles/global-coal-power-expected-to-hit-record-despite-climate-fight-11639737307 https://www.wsj.com/articles/global-coal-power-expected-to-h...
Alex3917 5y ago
The vast majority of the dams being torn down are from old mills, not hydro dams. They serve no economic purpose and are highly dangerous, in addition to preventing millions of fish from living in the rivers.
tomrod 5y ago
0. But it would require giving up some creature comforts.
labster 5y ago
Not as much energy as you think. The main obstacle to removing dams is getting funding. One dam locally is finally being removed 20 years after literally everyone local agreed it should be removed. 90% silted up as it is. But you have to pay for the unsafe bridge downstream before you cut open the dam. It sure would be nice to have had 20 years more sand on the beach to fight erosion. Anyway, there are lots of little dams like this everywhere that have negative economic value, but no one wants to pay the cost to remove them.
- emptybits 5y ago
  Hm. Not so simple. In my province (BC), over 90% of our electricity is generated by dams on rivers.[1] I agree with you that some dams are mostly negative. And all dams have some negatives. Witness our Site C dam project currently under construction.[2] It has been a political, environmental, legal, First Nations, and agricultural shitshow. I just think it's worth knowing that river dams still produce the vast majority of electricity for a lot of people on this part of the planet. I vote for change. Fingers crossed. [1] https://www.cer-rec.gc.ca/en/data-analysis/energy-markets/provincial-territorial-energy-profiles/provincial-territorial-energy-profiles-british-columbia.html https://www.cer-rec.gc.ca/en/data-analysis/energy-markets/pr... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Site_C_dam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Site_C_dam
  - soperj 5y ago
    There's like a 140 hydro generating stations in BC. Majority of them produce a negligible amount of power. [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_generating_stations_in_British_Columbia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_generating_stations_in...
GongOfFour 5y ago
There are 84,000 dams in the United States. More than one a day since we became a country. Most of them don't generate any meaningful electricity, but they do disrupt habitat for many native fish species. I would like to see them all destroyed. We can find electricity elsewhere.
- roamerz 5y ago
  Yeah let’s let all of our precious water flow freely back into the ocean where it becomes saltwater. Without water life dies. But I guess at least the fish will live.
- jazzyjackson 5y ago
  electricity is not the only reason we dam rivers, millions of acres of agriculture is irrigated via damning and diverting rivers
  - liketochill 5y ago
    And flood control
  - kajecounterhack 5y ago
    I guess irrigation can be "damning" to rivers :) Jokes aside, everything's a tradeoff and while flood control / irrigation is helpful to farmers, it can also introduce a resiliency problem in quake zones, since a dam breakage can cause devastating floods. Actually, it doesn't even have to be an earthquake. Exhibit A: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oroville_Dam_crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oroville_Dam_crisis
  - numtel 5y ago
    Which is why emerging precision fermentation technologies for starches and proteins are very important so that land used for agriculture can be rewilded.
- soperj 5y ago
  July 4, 1776 - December 17, 2021 => 89,650 days Off, but really not by much.
oh_sigh 5y ago
I think you're imagining Hoover dam getting torn down, when really it is a 6' dam built 150 years ago with no hydroelectric that is causing problems for certain habitats.
kajecounterhack 5y ago
Aside from the point that most dams don't produce a ton of power, salmonid spawning in the ecosystem also adds nitrogen to banks that encourages vegetation growth, which is beneficial in many ways for both our water supply (e.g. shade helps prevent evaporative losses, trees provide beavers opportunity to build habitat to increase net groundwater storage) and for carbon sequestration via plant growth. The American west has a drought resilience problem and restoring salmon/trout/beaver habitat can be an effective way to attack the problem on several levels. Dams are particularly damaging to Salmonids, both by acting as spawning barriers AND by warming the water to a level that can make survival difficult (salmonids need cold water). Look at dams like Oroville and Hoover now -- despite producing a lot of electricity, they are not resilient to drought, and river systems lose a lot of drought resistance when you add dams. When you dam a river, you slow and warm the water -- this threatens entire ecosystems adapted to survival where the river runs. Particularly in salmonid / coldwater fish habitats, dams are pretty damaging. If you want to learn more about the subject, there are a lot of books & documentaries about the Eel river that are worth reading and watching -- the Eel is a good case study in what happens when you dam a river, and what happens when you un-dam it.
bmitc 5y ago
Some hydroelectric power plants actually have greater emissions than even coal power plants, and that's ignoring that dams are much worse for the extended local ecosystems. The dams in the Pacific Northwest have decimated the wild salmon population. Salmon are big, meat eating fish that sustain several other animals, such as the Southern Resident orcas. This population of orcas is literally being starved by us destroying the salmon population., amongst the other challenges they face due to humans, such as poisoning and toxicity.
- patrick451 5y ago
  > Salmon are big, meat eating fish that sustain several other animals So are cattle. Sounds like we just saved a bunch of carbon so we can keep eating steak for a while.
  - rembicilious 5y ago
    Cattle are big, meat eating fish that sustain several other animals? Cattle in their current form are a “crop” that sort of sustains humans and their pets. It is likely that this is not an efficient way to sustain humans, but it’s easy and profitable.

melling 5y ago

We are using record amounts of coal globally. https://www.wsj.com/articles/global-coal-power-expected-to-hit-record-despite-climate-fight-11639737307 https://www.wsj.com/articles/global-coal-power-expected-to-h...

Alex3917 5y ago

The vast majority of the dams being torn down are from old mills, not hydro dams. They serve no economic purpose and are highly dangerous, in addition to preventing millions of fish from living in the rivers.

tomrod 5y ago

0. But it would require giving up some creature comforts.

labster 5y ago

Not as much energy as you think. The main obstacle to removing dams is getting funding. One dam locally is finally being removed 20 years after literally everyone local agreed it should be removed. 90% silted up as it is. But you have to pay for the unsafe bridge downstream before you cut open the dam. It sure would be nice to have had 20 years more sand on the beach to fight erosion. Anyway, there are lots of little dams like this everywhere that have negative economic value, but no one wants to pay the cost to remove them.

emptybits 5y ago
Hm. Not so simple. In my province (BC), over 90% of our electricity is generated by dams on rivers.[1] I agree with you that some dams are mostly negative. And all dams have some negatives. Witness our Site C dam project currently under construction.[2] It has been a political, environmental, legal, First Nations, and agricultural shitshow. I just think it's worth knowing that river dams still produce the vast majority of electricity for a lot of people on this part of the planet. I vote for change. Fingers crossed. [1] https://www.cer-rec.gc.ca/en/data-analysis/energy-markets/provincial-territorial-energy-profiles/provincial-territorial-energy-profiles-british-columbia.html https://www.cer-rec.gc.ca/en/data-analysis/energy-markets/pr... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Site_C_dam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Site_C_dam
- soperj 5y ago
  There's like a 140 hydro generating stations in BC. Majority of them produce a negligible amount of power. [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_generating_stations_in_British_Columbia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_generating_stations_in...

GongOfFour 5y ago

There are 84,000 dams in the United States. More than one a day since we became a country. Most of them don't generate any meaningful electricity, but they do disrupt habitat for many native fish species. I would like to see them all destroyed. We can find electricity elsewhere.

roamerz 5y ago
Yeah let’s let all of our precious water flow freely back into the ocean where it becomes saltwater. Without water life dies. But I guess at least the fish will live.
jazzyjackson 5y ago
electricity is not the only reason we dam rivers, millions of acres of agriculture is irrigated via damning and diverting rivers
- liketochill 5y ago
  And flood control
- kajecounterhack 5y ago
  I guess irrigation can be "damning" to rivers :) Jokes aside, everything's a tradeoff and while flood control / irrigation is helpful to farmers, it can also introduce a resiliency problem in quake zones, since a dam breakage can cause devastating floods. Actually, it doesn't even have to be an earthquake. Exhibit A: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oroville_Dam_crisis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oroville_Dam_crisis
- numtel 5y ago
  Which is why emerging precision fermentation technologies for starches and proteins are very important so that land used for agriculture can be rewilded.
soperj 5y ago
July 4, 1776 - December 17, 2021 => 89,650 days Off, but really not by much.

oh_sigh 5y ago

I think you're imagining Hoover dam getting torn down, when really it is a 6' dam built 150 years ago with no hydroelectric that is causing problems for certain habitats.

kajecounterhack 5y ago

Aside from the point that most dams don't produce a ton of power, salmonid spawning in the ecosystem also adds nitrogen to banks that encourages vegetation growth, which is beneficial in many ways for both our water supply (e.g. shade helps prevent evaporative losses, trees provide beavers opportunity to build habitat to increase net groundwater storage) and for carbon sequestration via plant growth. The American west has a drought resilience problem and restoring salmon/trout/beaver habitat can be an effective way to attack the problem on several levels. Dams are particularly damaging to Salmonids, both by acting as spawning barriers AND by warming the water to a level that can make survival difficult (salmonids need cold water). Look at dams like Oroville and Hoover now -- despite producing a lot of electricity, they are not resilient to drought, and river systems lose a lot of drought resistance when you add dams. When you dam a river, you slow and warm the water -- this threatens entire ecosystems adapted to survival where the river runs. Particularly in salmonid / coldwater fish habitats, dams are pretty damaging. If you want to learn more about the subject, there are a lot of books & documentaries about the Eel river that are worth reading and watching -- the Eel is a good case study in what happens when you dam a river, and what happens when you un-dam it.

bmitc 5y ago

Some hydroelectric power plants actually have greater emissions than even coal power plants, and that's ignoring that dams are much worse for the extended local ecosystems. The dams in the Pacific Northwest have decimated the wild salmon population. Salmon are big, meat eating fish that sustain several other animals, such as the Southern Resident orcas. This population of orcas is literally being starved by us destroying the salmon population., amongst the other challenges they face due to humans, such as poisoning and toxicity.

patrick451 5y ago
> Salmon are big, meat eating fish that sustain several other animals So are cattle. Sounds like we just saved a bunch of carbon so we can keep eating steak for a while.
- rembicilious 5y ago
  Cattle are big, meat eating fish that sustain several other animals? Cattle in their current form are a “crop” that sort of sustains humans and their pets. It is likely that this is not an efficient way to sustain humans, but it’s easy and profitable.