Article

From June 2013 World Rivers Review The Malaysian state of Sarawak, located on the island of Borneo, is rich with tropical forests bisected by powerful rivers. Five years ago, Sarawak’s authoritarian ruler Abdul Taib Mahmud announced that he will “transform Sarawak into a developed state” by building 12 large dams, mostly to power neighboring states. The forests are home to tens of thousands of indigenous people who have suffered human rights abuses for decades as Taib’s government has seized native lands for the benefit of his family’s timber and palm oil companies. When the Intern

The top quarter of Glines Canyon Dam was removed from the Elwha River with a hydraulic hammer on a barge anchored upstream of the dam. Photo by National Park Service, courtesy of Lower Klallam Tribal Library From World Rivers Review June 2013 Those whose passion is river restoration refer to summer as “dam removal season.” And this season, there is a lot to celebrate, with some very large dam removals on key rivers. The final environmental impact statement on what would be the largest dam-removal project in California history was released in April by the US Department of the Interior. It

From World Rivers Review June 2013 More than half of the rivers previously thought to exist in China appear to be missing, according to China’s "First National Water Census Bulletin" published in March. Only 22,909 rivers were located by surveyors, compared with the more than 50,000 in the 1990s, according to a three-year study by the Ministry of Water Resources and the National Bureau of Statistics. In an interview with the South China Morning Post, Huang He, China's Deputy Director of the Ministry of Water Resources, blamed the discrepancy on " inaccurate estimates in the past, as well as

From World Rivers Review June 2013 According to mainstream international financial institutions, foreign aid agencies, and national government planners in Laos, the way to lift up underdeveloped villages and to meet regional energy needs in an environmentally sustainable way is to dam its rivers and export the hydroelectric power to its neighbors. This short-sighted economic program, which is meant to attract foreign investors and bring a steady flow of revenues, overlooks the very real long-term impacts of large dams, including: inundation of productive lands, decimation of downstream fisheri

Brent Blackwelder in action. Photo by Friends of Earth From June 2013 World Rivers Review Brent Blackwelder is an icon in the US environmental movement. If his lifelong efforts to protect the planet were an ecosystem, it would take the form of a deep lake (the long history, the many issues, the depth of knowledge) flowing into a swift river (the boundless energy, the fast-flowing thought process, the “lead the charge” attitude). The first Earth Day inspired him to leap into early efforts to protect rivers, legislate clean water, and reform economic drivers that harmed the planet. He’s

It’s another standoff in the Amazon, and it could get very ugly very fast. On Monday, 170 indigenous people armed with bows and arrows from the Xingu River region again occupied a work site at the controversial Belo Monte Dam construction site, grinding to a halt work on one of the world’s largest construction projects.

Having spent heavily to make the world’s third-biggest hydroelectric project greener, Brazil risks getting a poor return on its $14 billion investment

This article was originally published by the Latin American BureauBorn and raised in Mangabal, a traditional community to be potentially impacted by the Jatobá dam, Odila Braga has also raised her children here. The idea of having to relocate to Itaituba is a constant source of anxiety. Photo courtesy of Bruna Rocha On Monday, 16th April 2013 a Federal Appeals Court determined that “Operação Tapajós” – an armed intervention by military and police forces to control indigenous protests over technical studies on their lands in preparation for the controversial São Luíz do Tapajós da

The Munduruku indigenous community in Pará state say they have been betrayed by the authorities, who are pushing ahead with plans to build a cascade of hydropower plants on the Tapajós River without their permission.

New research reveals that fish-passage facilities at US Atlantic Coast mainstem dams don't work at maintaining healthy runs of migrating species. We asked the lead scientist, Jed Brown, about his team's findings.