• Water

New Study Finds That Many Dams Are Located In Protected Areas, Many More Planned

• #30x30
• #WorldWildlifeFund
• conservation
• dam
• fresh water
• protected areas
• water quality
• World Wildlife Fund

A recent study published in Conservation Letters found that over 500 dams in planning stages or already constructed are located within protected areas. As Yale E360 reported this week, this study is significant in that it is the first to measure how many dams are being built in protected areas, including in national parks, nature reserves, indigenous areas, and more. 

Why This Matters: As the article in Conservation Letters lays out, these protected areas are an “essential tool” in the conservation of freshwater biodiversity.

• Water

Dam Failures a Risk Across the Country Due to Climate Change

• #climatecrisis
• climate change
• dam
• dam failure
• environment
• extreme weather
• rain
• storms

The Edenville Dam failure in Michigan causing thousands to evacuate puts a spotlight on a problem that the American Society of Civil Engineers highlighted in 2017 when it gave our country a “D” for dam safety (yep – that’s it’s grade) but this grade has not significantly improved in the last 20 years.

Why This Matters:  When we think about the security risks to our nation, we need to start counting infrastructure failure due to climate change as one of the most troubling.

• Water

Some Dams Survive Through Inertia — Time to Take Them Down?

• #30x30
• dam
• dam removal
• fish
• restoration
• river
• wildlife

The removal of legacy dams, which were first constructed dozens to more than a hundred years ago, is proving to be increasingly popular to restore river flows now that they are no longer serving any purpose for generating power or driving industrial uses. 

Why This Matters:  There is no doubt that a free-flowing river is a healthy river.  As has been much discussed recently, the need to do everything we can to restore and conserve the natural world to stave off the next wave of extinctions and to combat climate change.

• Water

Investigation By Associated Press Reveals More Than 1600 Risky Dams in the U.S.

• dam
• flood
• Green New Deal
• Infrastructure

The results of a two-year investigation by the Associated Press (AP) were published this week and the findings were shocking — nearly 1,700 dams located in 44 states and Puerto Rico were rated as “high-hazard” dams that are in poor or unsatisfactory condition.  Experts believe the actual number of risky dams is even higher — […]

• Water

The Gila River Named Most Endangered

• Cuyahoga River
• dam
• endangered rivers
• Gila River
• Hudson River
• Mississippi River
• pollution
• Willamette River

The environmental group American Rivers published their annual list of the “most endangered” rivers in the U.S. and this year the Gila River took the top spot because of a planned diversion project that would block the last free-flowing river in New Mexico.  According to USA Today, the rest of the top five most endangered were: the Hudson River, New York; the Upper Mississippi River, Illinois, Iowa, Missouri; the Green-Duwamish River, Washington; and the Willamette River, Oregon.