One of the most dramatic and deliberate impacts that humans have had on the natural environment involve dams. By diverting rivers to meet water, energy, and transportation needs, dams have had a tremendous impact on the way people are able to live.
According to the Swedish Research Council, the flow of water in more than half of the world’s rivers is regulated by dams. Not counting irrigation for agriculture, 172 of the 292 largest rivers are controlled. Taken together, these dams can store about 15 percent of the annual freshwater runoff in the world.
The Three Gorges dam on the Yangtze River in China, shown here still under construction, has the distinction of being the largest. It’s planned to be 200 yards tall! It’s also planned to be the largest source of hydroelectric power in the world, and will generate the equivalent electricity of 15 nuclear power plants. It will be completed in 2009.
It [displaced] more than 1 million people. The 265 billion gallons of raw sewage and 700 million tons of sediment deposited in the Yangtze River annually will no longer be carried out to sea and will back up in the reservoir. Over 1,000 mines and factories containing potentially hazardous materials will be submerged. But the largest risk is the catastrophe that could occur from an error in construction, which has been so plagued by corruption that even the state-controlled media has criticized the loose financing of the project. This project, on a colossal scale, highlights the looming environmental risks to China’s rise. Asia Times
Chinese environmental scientists are worried that the future operation of the Three Gorges dam could cause a wide strip of land stretching for thousands of kilometres to become geologically unstable, seriously polluted and a dangerous source of epidemic disease. Source
Large dam construction projects can be seen as humankind’s attempt to control nature by changing the course and speed of a river. Is controlling nature a worthwhile goal for humankind? Should we try to live in harmony with nature instead? Throughout history, philosophers such as John Muir, Henry David Thoreau, Rachel Carson, and Gifford Pinchot have argued about these and other ideas relating to human interaction with the natural world. Lesson Plans
What’s left? Rivers in the tundra of Alaska, and rivers in northern coniferous forests of Siberia. All the temperate rivers are taken. Canada is already successfully building dams in sparsely populated areas for the export of electricity and fresh water.
Thanks to Mikel and his amazing new service.
Jesus H. !!! Is there no way people can get power that wont piss you off?!? Do you power your Mac with a hamster wheel you run around? Or do you have a 20 ft windmill sprouting from a helmet on your head?
This website is solar powered.
Yeah right.
Dear anon-
If you’re so eager to see your words in ‘print’, why sign in anonymously?
Nanette Ward
- who adores Bergey wind generators.
This is probably the stickiest issue with respect to energy: not merely which energy sources use the least land or have fewest deaths, but what you believe should be the social implications of energy generation and use. A lot of the debate revolves around whether we should have distributed generation or continue with a grid. Some of these questions are social and political and may not necessarily be answered by just technical data.
Displacing that much weight in one area may cause earthquakes. This thought crossed my mind when the tsunami struck on Dec. 26
Although I do think more people will die from the inhalation of an Aspergillus fungus than the bird epidemic, I cant but wonder if the epidemic did start in the above mentioned nesting ground.
The image that you call the ” Three Gorges Dam” is another dam down stream from the construction site where the Three Gorges islocated. This image is of the Gezhou Dam at the site of Yichang, China..