Hydro dam the energy of the future?
Hydro dam are one of the cleanest and cheapest renewable energy that is available to be produce at a large scale. They are able to produce more electricity than solar and wind and at a more stable rate. The carbon emission are low and there is no waste produced in the making. Beneath all that, there is a big price to be paid. Before, during and after the dam is built, nature are being being destroyed proportional to the size of the dam being built. There are also constant hazardous risk every moment the dam exist. Before the building of the dam First a location that is suitable for building a dam are in mountains and have a river running through it. There will exist an ecosystem such as a forest with animals and there will be some indigenous people living on that area. So before a dam would be built, the whole area would need to be cleared. Forest will be torn down till there is nothing but soil. This is to prevent a problem arising when the dam is build. By doing so, they are destroying a large part of nature. Even the fishes are not spared. Some species that require running water to breed and making a dam would destroy that breeding area Ecosystem that took years to be built are torn down while later being filled with water. Unique plants and wildlife perished. The indigenous people would need to be relocated else where. Their culture and way of life could not be sustained any longer. Sometimes the places they been relocated are far worse than where they used to live and they are not compensated for their lost. They would have to start all over again in the new land possibly with harsher conditions than before. When the dam is active The river would no longer exist but a man made lake of huge proportion would appear. With the still water conditions, it would an attractive places for diseases spreading insects to breed. People who live near the dam will face a great risk to their health. Since the dam are usually build in the mountains, there is also a risk of land slides occurring. The land would not be stable when there is a sudden build up of surrounding water rise up a few hundred or even thousand of kilometers above sea level. This is happened to the Vajont Dam in 1963 where around 2000 people died due to land slides. Restoring is harder than building The damage done takes longer restore. Ecology that was destroyed would take hundreds of years to rebuild and even then there is no telling it would be the same anymore. Even then, governments are still building dam to accommodate the industrial needs. Will we be able to find a replacement in time before we destroyed all of our rivers?
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