Small Hydropower Dams are not Good for the Environment

Small hydropower dams seem like a good idea in theory, but according to a recent Forbes article, these types of generation assets harm the environment despite the relatively small amount of power they produce. Simply put, they do more harm than good.

The Negative Environmental ROI of Small Hydropower Dams

The Forbes article looks at Switzerland as a case study. Specifically, a 2008 renewable energy financial incentive spurred the development of a whopping 116 small hydropower dams in streams throughout the country.

These dams generate less than 1% of Switzerland’s annual power requirements, yet the resulting stream fragmentation negatively impacts the environment by disrupting fish, water flow and aesthetics. Globally, there are more than 83,000 small hydropower dams in operation, wreaking similar environmental havoc.

Why this is Bad for Utility Emergency Preparedness

From a utility emergency preparedness perspective, the main downside of this trend is that construction of these types of projects diverts money away from more effective and efficient renewable energy projects like solar and wind energy, which reduces the positive benefits of clean energy laws and initiatives. And climate change mitigation that is reduced or slowed could translate into additional years or even decades of having to deal with severe weather and the accompanying increase in outage frequency and severity.

The article makes it clear that small hydropower projects make sense in certain situations, but their proliferation is a problem. The solution, according to the article, is to educate people about the negative environmental impact of small hydropower dams, and to classify them differently than solar and wind projects so developers have less of an incentive to pursue these projects.