What's The Deal With Dam Removals?

There’s a growing movement to reevaluate dams, to figure out whether their purpose – for making electricity, controlling floods, recreation, or storing irrigation and drinking water – outweigh the challenges they pose for fish.

When Dams Come Down, Salmon and Sand Can Prosper

Photo: Andy Ritchie/National Park Service

When people urge the removal of dams they say are strangling rivers in the West, it’s usually fish they’re worried about. Studies of dam-removal projects show that migratory species like salmon respond quickly to improved conditions once a dam is removed.

But the removal of a dam on the Elwha River in northern Washington State — the largest such project in the United States — is demonstrating that there can be another beneficiary: the beach.

LINK (via:The NY Times)

Why They're Coming Down

PBS's NOVA Next takes a look at the "Undamming of America."

Gordon Grant didn’t really get excited about the dam he blew up until the night a few weeks later when the rain came. It was October of 2007, and the concrete carnage of the former Marmot Dam had been cleared. A haphazard mound of earth was the only thing holding back the rising waters of the Sandy River. But not for long. Soon the river punched through, devouring the earthen blockade within hours. Later, salmon would swim upstream for the first time in 100 years.

LINK

2 Of Oregon's Worst Dams For Fish Are Coming Down

Southern Oregon is beginning to get a reputation as a place where efforts to improve fish passage are succeeding. And two significant dams in the Rogue watershed are coming down this summer.

LINK (via:OPB)

After 15 Years, Land Trust Still Pushing For Removal Of East Burke Dam

As spring returns, controversy swirls over a dam in East Burke Vermont. The land trust that owns the dam wants to tear it down. But other residents see the dam as an historic buttress to the local economy.

LINK (via: Vermont Public Radio)

Study Finds Rivers Recover Rapidly Once Dams Are Gone

A new study sums up what scientists now know about the environmental effects of removing dams from rivers.

It concludes that rivers and fish respond quickly after a dam is removed, and the results are mostly positive.

LINK (via: OPB)