Just keep swimming

March 15, 2025 7:59 PM

Dam removal on the Klamath shows immediate returns

Within 10 days of completing the final in-water work at Iron Gate Dam – an earthfill structure farthest downstream – more than 6,000 Chinook salmon were observed migrating upstream into newly accessible habitat over a two-week period

posted by Mitheral (8 comments total)

Dam removal projects are one of the few things that let me feel any sort of hope for the future these days.

They’re usually local, grassroots movements grounded in science and research. Many individuals working together trying to make a difference, often succeeding.

I can watch dam removal projects on YouTube alllll day long. It’s almost therapeutic.
posted by davey_darling at 9:10 PM on March 15 [9 favorites]

So I'm a parks commissioner these days where I'm at, and we're facing the decision to remove or maintain a dam in our area. Fellow commissioner noted to myself and a couple community members that - paraphrasing - the river up and downstream the dam doesn't have any fish, life, etc.

I countered, roughly quoted, "You don't know that, the whole river system is dammed up".

And I love articles like this as they provide evidence that a single dam removal can do a lot of good aside from saving a community money in the long run.
posted by JoeXIII007 at 10:08 PM on March 15 [14 favorites]

The salmon were waiting, coming back, year after year, and finally.
posted by Pastor of Muppets at 11:36 PM on March 15 [5 favorites]

In my neighborhood, the Elwha River dam removals -- and the ecosystem restoration afterwards, it wasn't automatic it was a lot of muddy labor -- was my happy story of the 2010s. Hasn't been censored off nps.gov yet.

Hydropower is renewable per watt-hour generated, but the creation of generation capacity is deeply destructive, at every real-world dam site. And a dam is pretty commonly a moral or a treaty violation against an indigenous people, if you look.

I've deployed code in a datacenter powered by the drowning of Celilo Falls, a trading and fishing site since time immemorial. May Celilo Falls rise again
posted by away for regrooving at 11:39 PM on March 15 [4 favorites]

Now do Lake Pedder.
posted by rory at 1:28 AM on March 16

Grady Hillhouse at Practical Engineering on the logistics of dams and sediment [16½ min YT cw: dirt] last week.
posted by BobTheScientist at 2:03 AM on March 16 [1 favorite]

Dam removal projects are one of the few things that let me feel any sort of hope for the future these days.

Eradication of rats and other invasive species on uninhabited islands is a similar kind of success story being repeated in many places around the world these days.
posted by snofoam at 7:14 AM on March 16 [3 favorites]

I understand that this article focuses more on the technicalities, which are interesting, but it's important to foreground the fact that the restoration of the Klamath is very much an Indigenous-led effort (they do talk about it, but just at the end). And a ton of the opposition to dam removal is SUPER racist, as you will certainly discover if you unwisely read the comments on any article/Instagram story/whatever about it.

I grew up driving through the Klamath watershed and I, and a lot of my friends, were straight-up moved to tears to see these dams gone. It's a huge deal and, I hope, a model for dam removal elsewhere.
posted by Nibbly Fang at 7:23 AM on March 16 [12 favorites]