2016: The Year in Review

The Bargny Coast Water Keepers in Senegal celebrate the Day of Action for Rivers 2016.

Bargny Coast Water Keeper

What a difference a year makes.

At the end of 2015, the picture for river communities was grim. The World Bank had doubled down on its support for large dams, and a dam-building boom was underway.

Now, as 2016 draws to a close, we’re celebrating a string of victories unlike anything we’ve seen in the last 15 years. 

From Peru to Chile, Brazil to China, financiers and builders are stopping projects and protecting rivers. They’re doing it because these projects don’t make economic sense. They’re doing it because these projects are harming the very people they’re supposed to help. They’re doing it because there are better ways to generate power.

This doesn’t mean we’re winning everywhere. In the Mekong, fisheries are collapsing and the delta is suffering from unprecedented saltwater intrusion because of upstream dams – yet the building continues. In Niger, the World Bank has signaled it will continue to support Kandadji Dam, a horrendous project that will displace 65,000 people in a country that has no good land for relocation.

But perhaps the greatest tragedy took place in March, when our longtime friend and partner Berta Cáceres, the Honduran activist, was murdered in cold blood for her opposition to the Agua Zarca Dam. This was a horrible moment for her organization, COPINH; for Honduras; and for indigenous activists and water protectors around the world. Our hearts broke.

But these challenges have only strengthened our resolve. The best way to honor Berta’s memory is to continue this fight – for indigenous rights, for our freshwater ecosystems, for our watersheds, for life itself. It’s a good fight, and one we must never abandon. 

In 2017, we will build on all we’ve experienced this year. 

We’ll be ramping up our campaigns for permanent river protection in Latin America and globally. 

We’ll explore new ways to defend the defenders – the frontline communities facing threats, intimidation and violence for their courageous defense of our natural resources.

And we’ll work hard to offer solutions to countries that want economic development without environmental destruction.

Journey with us through the challenging and inspiring events of 2016, and we hope you’ll stand with us in 2017. Thanks for your support.

January

• Scientists publish new studies harshly condemning plans to build dams in the Amazon, Congo and Mekong rivers.
• We explore the vast potential for integrating more solar and wind into African grids, to save Africa’s rivers, during the Powering Africa summit.
• Our Thai partners appeal a court decision rejecting the villagers’ lawsuit against the Xayaburi Dam.

March

• Our longtime friend and partner, the Goldman Prize winner and anti-dam activist Berta Caceres, is murdered in Honduras. The world mourns, and we ask hard questions about “Who Killed Berta Caceres.”
• Success! Our supporters demand European funders end their support for Agua Zarca Dam, the project Berta died fighting. The funders suspend their support for the project.
• Success! In Borneo, the Baram Dam is stopped after a sustained campaign against it.

April

• With the Klamath agreement signed, the biggest river restoration in US history gets underway. We explore its global significance.
• We hold mapping workshops with dam-affected people on the Teles Pires River in the Brazilian Amazon.
• The UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples visits the Amazon and meets with dam-affected people, with our support.
• Brazil suspends the licensing process of the controversial São Luiz do Tapajós Dam in the Amazon.

May

• We record an interview with Bruno Kapandji, Project Director for the  Inga 3 hydropower project in the Democratic Republic of Congo. He states that the world’s largest hydropower project, Grand Inga, can go ahead without environmental or social impact assessments.
• We publicize Kapandji’s outrageous statement, and predict the project will unravel.
• Police kill two anti-dam protestors in Northern India. We take a deeper look at this growing trend, as indigenous communities increasingly find themselves in the crosshairs of development.
• Success! After months of sustained pressure from an international coalition of groups, including International Rivers, funders exit Agua Zarca Dam.
• We examine new developments that suggest we may be reaching the era of “peak dam.”

June

• As Venezuela is rocked by an energy crisis brought on by drought and the country’s dependence on Guri Dam, we look at hydropower’s increasing vulnerability in an era of climate change.
• We release a new report about Peru’s energy future which is adopted by local groups and government in their energy planning process.
• We raise red flags about Niger’s impending Kandadji Dam, an avoidable humanitarian disaster in the making.

July

• Success! The World Bank suspends funding for the troubled Inga 3 Dam on the Congo River. 

August

• We welcome Kate Horner as our new Executive Director.
• Success! In Chile, the energy company Endesa scraps six dams on five rivers, permanently relinquishing water rights to those rivers. The company cites sustained civil society opposition as one reason they’re pulling out.
• Success! In a massive win for indigenous groups and civil society, Brazil cancels the Sao Luis do Tapajos mega-dam on the Tapajos River in the Amazon.

September

• Success! The Brazilian government suspends Belo Monte’s operating license because Norte Energia failed to provide water and sanitation services to the city of Altamira.
• We welcome two new Co-Directors of Programs, Michael Simon and David Gordon, aboard. We call them the “river protection dream team.”

October

• Success! Peru says it won’t build large dams on the Amazonian portion of the Marañon River.
• New research confirms dam reservoirs as a significant source of methane emissions globally.
• Our analysis shows that the World Bank, after pursuing large dams, took a radical shift towards solar in 2015. Could this influence other financiers?

November 

• WWF finds we’re losing freshwater populations at an alarming rate.
• We release a new film about one of the world’s most controversial dam projects, “Belo Monte: After the Flood.”
• Success! Chile cancels the Pasada Mediterráneo Central hydroelectric plant, to be built on the Puelo River in the Los Lagos Region.

December

• Success! China will build no dams on its last major free-flowing river, the Nu, a hotbed of biodiversity and home to many ethnic minorities.
• Success! Argentina’s Supreme Court orders the suspension of the construction of the Kirchner and Cepernic dams in the province of Santa Cruz until the environmental impact assessment process and hearing is implemented.