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On January 22, 2009, our Chilean partners in the Patagonia Campaign delivered hundreds of personal letters – from 39 different US states and 9 different countries – to Eleodoro Matte, chief executive of the Matte Group that controls the Chilean partner in the plans for dams and transmission lines in Patagonia. Most of Chile’s leading media organizations published news of this extraordinary mail delivery to Mr. Matte. Read the articles about the delivery event (in Spanish).Here is one example of these powerful letters, from Dr. James McVey, a professor at the University of Colorado (Bould

The African Development Bank will soon consider funding for Gibe 3 Dam. A group of NGOs -- Bank Information Center, Campagna per la Riforma della Banca Mondiale, Friends of Lake Turkana, and International Rivers; and more recently, Indigenous Peoples of Africa Co-ordinating Committee (IPACC) and Anuak Justice Council -- requested a phone conference to understand the Bank's project preparation and to discuss project concerns. The phone conference was canceled by Bank staff. Instead, the Bank provided written responses to selected concerns. Below are our concerns and the Bank's responses. 1. C

Xiaoxi Dam, Hunan Province, China Tina Lea This large dam epitomizes the abuse of carbon offsets and the many flaws in the Kyoto Protocol's offsetting scheme, the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). In this case, the dam has evicted from their homes poor farmers in Hunan Province, China, while allowing Germany to burn more coal and still meet its Kyoto commitments. The German power utility RWE, one of the biggest CO2 emitters in Europe, intends to buy CDM credits (or offsets) from the now infamous Xiaoxi Dam on the Zishui River so that it can continue to expand its coal-fired electricity gener

One of the partners of the Patagonia Campaign, CRBM (Campaign for Reform of the World Bank) recently launched new actions in Italy to help us stop the potentially disastrous HidroAysén dam scheme in Chile. You can support this "Italian front" of our Patagonia Campaign by joining our online action against Enel! Enel, a giant Italian electric utility company, owns a controlling interest in the European partner for HidroAysén. The dams would displace families, disrupt livelihoods, thwart local tourism businesses and destroy thousands of acres of rare and endangered Chilean forests. The transm

Visit Friends of Lake Turkana Lake Turkana is a miraculous anomaly of life-giving water in a parched and unforgiving land. Formed millions of years ago in the tectonic upheavals that created East Africa’s Great Rift Valley, Turkana is the largest permanent desert lake in the world. The lake is home to the world's largest population of Nile crocodiles, hippos, and hundreds of bird and fish species. Its shores have revealed the oldest-known fossil remains of Homo habilis. Today, more than a quarter million indigenous peoples from at least ten tribes have become masters of wresting sustenance f

The International Hydropower Association created the Hydropower Sustainability Assessment Forum (HSAF) in 2007 in cooperation with governments, financial institutions and conservation organizations. The Forum's official goal is to "develop a broadly endorsed sustainability assessment tool" for the hydropower sector by the end of 2009. HSAF is currently preparing a new Sustainability Assessment Protocol with guidelines on more than 80 aspects of dam projects. The hydropower industry hopes that the Protocol can replace the framework of the World Commission on Dams (WCD) as the

International Day of Action for Rivers Internship Available International Rivers is looking for an intelligent, inspired and motivated multi-tasker to help organize the 13th Annual International Day of Action Against Dams and for Rivers, Water and Life, which will take place on March 14. This rewarding internship will be offered January - April 2010. The successful candidate will have the opportunity to communicate with river and human rights activists around the world, contribute to print and web publications, and be an integral part of a dynamic Berkeley non-profit office environmen

December 2008 World Rivers Review: Special Focus on River Restoration 1.Please provide a list and very short summary of the project(s) you have worked on and their status. Forty hydropower dams in Catalonia have been forced to release more water due to our efforts. The small, abandonded Guadalope Dam in Teruel will soon be demolished, restoring one of the best trout rivers of Spain. We have a campaign to remove Palombera Dam in Cantabria, the first of a series of three dams in the basin. Our report on instream flows on the Nansa River showed that ENDESA was causing great damage to the river,

December 2008 World Rivers Review: Special Focus on River Restoration 1.Please provide a list and very short summary of the project(s) you have worked on and their status. Removal of PacifiCorp's lower four Klamath River Dams. Currently a coalition of Tribes, conservation and fishing groups, farmers, and local governments support a basin wide restoration plan that is predicated on the removal of the lower four Klamath Dams. The groups continue to pressure PacifiCorp through lawsuits, grassroots actions, and media to work with affected communities to develop a dam removal plan. Ta

December 2008 World Rivers Review: Special Focus on River Restoration 1.Please provide a list and very short summary of the project(s) you have worked on and their status. I have worked on about 125 dam removal projects in one capacity or another from inception, planning, alternatives analysis, feasibility studies, technical oversight/assistance, scoping, field work, engineering design, environmental analysis/permitting, sediment analysis/management, project bidding and construction management/oversight. Therefore it is a bit hard for me to answer this question quickly or easily. I of c