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Journal article
Balancing hydropower and biodiversity in the Amazon, Congo, and Mekong
Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science), v 351(6269)
08 Jan 2016
PMID: 26744397
Featured in Collection : UN Sustainable Development Goals @ Drexel
Abstract
Basin-scale planning is needed to minimize impacts in mega-diverse rivers
The world's most biodiverse river basins—the Amazon, Congo, and Mekong—are experiencing an unprecedented boom in construction of hydropower dams. These projects address important energy needs, but advocates often overestimate economic benefits and underestimate far-reaching effects on biodiversity and critically important fisheries. Powerful new analytical tools and high-resolution environmental data can clarify trade-offs between engineering and environmental goals and can enable governments and funding institutions to compare alternative sites for dam building. Current site-specific assessment protocols largely ignore cumulative impacts on hydrology and ecosystem services as ever more dams are constructed within a watershed (
1
). To achieve true sustainability, assessments of new projects must go beyond local impacts by accounting for synergies with existing dams, as well as land cover changes and likely climatic shifts (
2
,
3
). We call for more sophisticated and holistic hydropower planning, including validation of technologies intended to mitigate environmental impacts. Should anything less be required when tampering with the world's great river ecosystems?
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Details
- Title
- Balancing hydropower and biodiversity in the Amazon, Congo, and Mekong
- Creators
- K. O. Winemiller - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.P. B. McIntyre - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.L. Castello - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.E. Fluet-Chouinard - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.T. Giarrizzo - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.S. Nam - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.I. G. Baird - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.W. Darwall - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.N. K. Lujan - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.I. Harrison - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.M. L. J. Stiassny - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.R. A. M. Silvano - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.D. B. Fitzgerald - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.F. M. Pelicice - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.A. A. Agostinho - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.L. C. Gomes - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.J. S. Albert - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.E. Baran - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.M. Petrere - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.C. Zarfl - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.M. Mulligan - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.J. P. Sullivan - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.C. C. Arantes - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.L. M. Sousa - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.A. A. Koning - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.D. J. Hoeinghaus - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.M. Sabaj - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.J. G. Lundberg - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.J. Armbruster - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.M. L. Thieme - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.P. Petry - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.J. Zuanon - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.G. Torrente Vilara - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.J. Snoeks - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.C. Ou - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.W. Rainboth - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.C. S. Pavanelli - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.A. Akama - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.A. van Soesbergen - See supplementary materials for author affiliationsL. Sáenz - See supplementary materials for author affiliations.
- Publication Details
- Science (American Association for the Advancement of Science), v 351(6269)
- Publisher
- American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Biodiversity, Earth, and Environmental Science (BEES); Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University
- Web of Science ID
- WOS:000367806500018
- Scopus ID
- 2-s2.0-84955141437
- Other Identifier
- 991019349844604721
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- Collaboration types
- Domestic collaboration
- International collaboration
- Web of Science research areas
- Environmental Sciences