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24 April is Armenian Genocide Memorial Day. In Armenian, it is called Medz Yeghern, "The Great Cataclysm". This banner is posted here from armenica.org to "Light the Night" on the eve of 24 April, in memory of the victims of the Armenian Genocide.
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A coalition of environmentalists, fishermen, and native American Indians wants the four power dams on Klamath River, Oregon, removed, arguing they have made a mess of the river’s ecosystem. The dams, they claim, have jeopardised salmon runs and ruined water quality, threatening both commercial and aboriginal fishing.
Wait a minute, says the power company. The Klamath dams provide clean hydroelectric energy to 70,000 homes. If that power source is taken down, it would have be replaced by coal- or natural gas-burning facilities, pumping massive amounts of carbon into the atmosphere. It’s a trade-off between water quality and air quality.
Whether the power company, PacifiCorp, wants to keep the dams because they improve air quality or simply because they are inexpensive to operate is not clear. But emphasizing an environmental argument that touches on climate change has added a new wrinkle to the longstanding debate over dam removal in the Pacific Northwest. In a region where plenty of residents measured their “carbon footprints” long before green became the new black, PacifiCorp is suggesting that righting one environmental wrong could lead to another, one that could affect people more than fish.
. . .
Those who support removing the dams largely dismiss the clean-energy argument, saying the benefits outweigh losing a relatively small source of hydropower. They note that PacifiCorp’s increased interest in the environment comes as recent rulings by judges and federal fisheries agencies have given new momentum for removal. The company’s federal license to run the dams expired last year, and the government has said PacifiCorp must build fish ladders over the four dams to get a new license, a proposition that could cost $300 million and reduce the power the dams generate, potentially making removal a less costly choice.
So, either solution will impose costs on the power company, which will passed straight through to customers.
University of Washington history professor John M Findlay points out that support for dam removal is strongest in the big cities of Portland and Seattle, where residents take for granted some of the lowest electricity rates in the country. Those low rates are made possible, of course, by the hydroelectric dams dotting the Pacific Northwest.
h/t: Faith-Science News
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