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Yeah, these made sense in 1925, when we produced just a fraction of what we produce today. But at this point maybe we should just start tearing out the ones th
by rootusrootus 3y ago
Yeah, these made sense in 1925, when we produced just a fraction of what we produce today. But at this point maybe we should just start tearing out the ones that aren't providing any other valuable service and budget for solar & wind to replace their output.
- Gibbon1 3y agoI think so. How little power some of these old dams produce is a bit shocking by modern standards. I remember the allies during WWII went to a bunch of trouble to knock out a some dams on the Ruhr. I think one of them produced 5MW of power. So these dams produce a round error amount of energy[1]. But the effect on the watershed is not a rounding error. And a lot of them are old which brings costs due to maintenance and engineering analysis. And that applies to the 60 year old power lines to tie these to the grid. [1] Compare with fish. Friends mom lived in Idaho which is popular with fishermen. Some state analysis showed fish tourism generates about $1000 per fish caught.