The AP published 4 articles today on dam removal in New England

[Thom Little]

Can't really give you an idea of what they all say with a copy and paste job, so it's best if you just go straight to the links. All four of them are very informative.


http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/N/NH_NEW_ENGLAND_DAMS_NHOL-?SITE=VARIT&SECTION=US&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2005-12-29-08-35-54

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/N/NH_NEW_ENGLAND_DAMS_LEGISLATION_NHOL-?SITE=VARIT&SECTION=US&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2005-12-29-08-35-55

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/N/NH_NEW_ENGLAND_DAMS_REMOVAL_NHOL-?SITE=VARIT&SECTION=US&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2005-12-29-08-35-55

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/N/NH_NEW_ENGLAND_DAMS_PRIVATE_OWNERS_NHOL-?SITE=VARIT&SECTION=US&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2005-12-29-08-35-54

[NNadir]

1. Thanks. These are interesting articles.

One wonders what will be involved when Lake Mead is filled with silt, as surely it will be.

[Oerdin]

3. New farmland?

If in 200 years Lake Mead silts up then we'll have nice & flat prime river front land. Either farm it or develop it. Or they could opt to do what the Panamanians do and dredge enough to keep it operating.

[NNadir]

4. Removing the dam would probably elicit some problems with Mexico.

That much silt all at once will probably involve some difficulty.

Personally I would not object to living in a world where the Hoover dam could be removed. By the time the dam is ready to be removed however, I suspect that some serious environmental shit will have long ago have hit the fan, not that much power will be available to make the fan's blades spin.

[mainegreen]

2. Interesting. Being from Maine I can tell you dams are everywhere.

There was a small one up the local brook from where I grew up. It created a pool about 13x13x8 feet, and the waterfall was about 10 feet. The 'mill' it had powered was teeny. All the kids swam there, but other then that this dam just sat there. No one looked after it, and it certainly wasn't on anyone's property. It's on no maps (you'd be hard pressed to even find the name of the creek!). Fortuanatly, this dam is made of the largest freaking granite blocks I've just about ever seen, so its going nowhere, but I know of many more in the area that are going to bust someday. Some have degraded visibly just since I was a kid about 15 years ago!