
By Reynard Loki
The Earth's rapidly changing climate due to human activity has ravaged the planet in numerous ways, causing melting glaciers and ice sheets, heat waves, droughts, wildfires, deadly hurricanes, species extinction and ecosystem losses. But climate change may also be impacting us on a very personal level that many of us don't even realize: our health.
According to a recent report published by the Medical Society Consortium on Climate and Health, climate change is becoming a serious public health enemy.
"The changes in our climate are creating conditions that harm human health through extreme weather events, reduced air and water quality, intense heat waves, spread of vector-borne diseases and other mechanisms," said Dr. Mona Sarfaty, the director of MSCCH, in a statement. The consortium represents more than 400,000 American physicians—more than half of all U.S. physicians. Many of these medical professionals, Sarfaty said, "know firsthand the harmful health effects of climate change on patients."
Elevated #Cancer Rates Linked to Environmental Quality https://t.co/kFUtBp3bKN @ewg @SierraClub @EnvDefenseFund @billmckibben @MarkRuffalo— EcoWatch (@EcoWatch)1494261950.0
Sarfaty, who also serves as the director of the program for climate and health at the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University, highlighted groups that are particularly at risk: "While climate change threatens the health of every American, some people are more vulnerable and are most likely to be harmed, including: infants and children; pregnant women; older adults; people with disabilities; people with preexisting or chronic medical conditions, including mental illnesses; people with limited means; indigenous peoples and those throughout the United States who face regional vulnerabilities."
The report highlighted three specific ways climate change harms human health:
1. Direct health harms, including respiratory ailments worsened by air pollution and longer allergy seasons, as well as injuries and deaths caused by extreme weather events like floods, droughts, heatwaves and wildfires.
2. The proliferation of diseases through insects carrying Lyme disease or Zika virus, and through contaminated water and food.
3. Mental health effects, particularly among survivors of extreme weather events, who can experience depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder and even increases in suicidal thoughts and behavior.
Unfortunately, President Trump isn't listening to these doctors. The president's proposed 2018 budget includes deep cuts to the EPA, hampering its ability to protect the country from the impacts of climate change, and essentially handing corporations a pass to pillage and destroy the natural environment.
"The amazing progress made by the U.S. EPA over the past 47 years stands at risk, and any reductions in budget or staffing will only further cripple environmental protection efforts, while sending a clear signal to polluters to further contaminate the Chesapeake Bay, Great Lakes, Puget Sound, as well as our rivers, streams and wetlands," said John O'Grady, president of American Federation of Government Employees Council 238, in a press statement.
In another anti-health, anti-environment move, the Trump administration last month violated the Clean Air Act when it suspended critical protections against methane leaks and other dangerous air pollution from the oil and gas industry.
"In its haste to do favors for its polluter cronies, the Trump EPA has broken the law," said Meleah Geertsma, senior attorney at the Natural Resources Defense Council, which filed a lawsuit against the EPA for the decision. "The Trump administration does not have unlimited power to put people's health in jeopardy with unchecked, unilateral executive action like this. Stopping methane leaks is a no-brainer—avoiding wasted gas, creating jobs, fighting climate change and cutting cancer-causing pollution all at once."
Medical Society Consortium on Climate and Health
Scientists have been warning the public about the possible negative impacts of climate change on human health for several years. The federal National Climate Assessment, which was released in 2014, warned that "climate change threatens human health and well-being in many ways, including impacts from increased extreme weather events, wildfire, decreased air quality and illnesses transmitted by food, water and diseases carriers such as mosquitoes and ticks."
According to the MSCCH report, only about one in three Americans is aware that people in the U.S. are being harmed now by climate change. But, as the report states, "based on several surveys, two out of every three doctors think climate change has direct relevance right now to patient care."
It has become abundantly clear that we must take a harder look at the specific ways our health is negatively impacted by a rapidly changing climate—and do something about it.
1. Air Pollution
The World Health Organization estimates that around seven million people worldwide die prematurely every year from lung and heart disease and cancer due to pollution. This pollution is mainly caused by small particulate matter emitted from the myriad the ways we combust fossil fuels. Inhaling tiny liquid or solid particles can lead to a variety of health problems, including cancer, heart disease, stroke and respiratory issues. In particular, ground-based ozone, produced by emissions from power stations, factories and motor vehicle exhaust, can worsen symptoms for asthma, bronchitis or emphysema. Scientists have even started calculating the impact of coal-fired pizza ovens.
In the U.S., power plants are the biggest source of carbon pollution, accounting for nearly a third of total greenhouse gas emissions, followed by transportation (26 percent) and industry (21 percent). Estimates vary, but the number of premature deaths in the U.S. due to the small particles pumped into the air in power plant emissions is somewhere between 7,500 and 52,000. "That's huge," wrote Jay Apt, co-director of the Carnegie Mellon Electricity Industry Center. "It is roughly comparable to the 40,000 people [who] died in car crashes in 2016."
"I see the effects of climate change on children here already," said Dr. Aparna Bole, a pediatrician at University Hospitals Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital and a member of the American Academy of Pediatrics' environmental health executive committee. "Here in Ohio we have high rates of pediatric asthma, so the poor air quality days that we see more and more of are a direct risk to children."
Extreme weather events linked to climate change are also impacting the quality of air. In 2008, a wildfire in North Carolina, ignited during the state's worst-ever drought, burned more than 45,000 acres of land. Researchers found that people living in counties affected by the fire's smoke plume had a 50 percent increase in trips to emergency departments from respiratory illness like chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, pneumonia and bronchitis.
"Blazing forests are just as damaging to human health as they are to homes and neighborhoods," John Meredith, an emergency room physician at East Carolina University, wrote in the MSCCH report. "Increasing temperatures and more frequent droughts caused by climate change are set to increase the number of wildfires in the U.S.—and worldwide. It's clear that not only our lungs, but also our hearts, are at serious risk."
The World Health Organization has raised the warning flag on dangerous air, saying that air pollution now poses a more severe public health threat than HIV or Ebola, and pointing out that 80 percent of all urban areas have unhealthy levels of air pollution. The agency estimated that climate change will be the root cause of some 240,000 deaths every year by 2030.
2. Proliferation of Disease
Historically, most incidents of Lyme disease happen in the Northeast, the normal range of the pathogen-carrying ticks. But as global warming increases the air temperature, those ticks can become active earlier, with their geographic range spreading to the Midwest. The geographic spread of several mosquito-borne diseases, including West Nile, Zika and dengue fever, is also impacted by the rise in surface air temperature. A 2016 U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study found that the tick that carries Lyme disease has been reported in 45.7 percent of U.S. counties, up from 30 percent in 1998.
In addition, some chronic diseases are worsened by extreme heat, with the young and the elderly at the most risk. The European heat wave during the summer of 2003 killed more than 70,000 people; particularly vulnerable were those with chronic heart or lung disease.
A 2016 study conducted by the University of Colorado found that the worldwide increase in heat waves may be linked to the kidney disease epidemic impacting workers who are increasingly exposed to extreme heat and the resulting dehydration. "There's evidence that long periods of heat waves have increased more significantly with climate change; when it's extremely hot the risk for kidney damage begins to really become evident," said senior study author Dr. Richard Johnson.
The consortium's conclusions about the climate-related spread of infectious disease are supported by comparing the incidence rates today versus two decades ago. According to the CDC, whooping cough cases have more than doubled since the late 1990s; incidences of Hib disease, caused by the bacteria Haemophilus influenzae, have more than doubled since 2000; and measles cases have steadily grown since 2003.
"Across the country, doctors are seeing more patients struck ill by serious diseases like Lyme disease and West Nile fever," Nitin Damle, president of the American College of Physicians, wrote in the consortium's report. "Because of the changing climate and the spread of vectors, we expect that Americans will continue to face new diseases and familiar diseases in new places."
Many of those who experience extreme weather events such as floods, droughts, heat waves and hurricanes also experience stress and serious mental health issues, from anxiety and depression to post-traumatic stress disorder and increases in suicidal thoughts and behavior.
Some coping mechanisms, such as alcohol or drug abuse, only add to the health risk for these sufferers. During extreme weather events, children in particular are at risk, as many must undergo the stress and anxiety caused by a prolonged separation from their parents. Forty percent of doctors surveyed for the report said mental health is a specific health harm related to climate change.
Anyone who is exposed to a climate-related natural disaster is at risk of experiencing mental health issues, but the report's authors note, "people at higher risk include children, the elderly, pregnant women and women in general, those with preexisting mental illness, the poor, homeless and first responders. Farmers and other people who rely on the natural environment for their livelihoods are also at higher risk."
President Trump: Are You Listening to the Advice of Doctors?
In response to these increasing threats to public health, the consortium has called for "concerted action" to "reduce heat-trapping pollution by reducing energy waste and accelerating the inevitable transition to clean renewable energy."
Sarfaty joined many environmentalists and public health advocates in criticizing President Trump's recent executive order which was intended to promote the exploitation of the nation's "vast energy resources," saying the order "threatens progress toward addressing the risks, and doctors across the country are already seeing the harms to human health associated with the resulting degradation of our life-sustaining environment."
"Here's the message from America's doctors on climate change: it's not only happening in the Arctic Circle, it's happening here," she said. "It's not only a problem for us in 2100, it's a problem now. And it's not only hurting polar bears, it's hurting us."
"The science is very clear and there's some real opportunity to impact patients here and now," said Bole. "If we're serious about helping people to be healthier, we can't ignore issues like climate and energy policy."
Unfortunately for the American people, that's exactly what President Trump is doing.
Reposted with permission from our media associate AlterNet.
By Deborah Moore, Michael Simon and Darryl Knudsen
There's some good news amidst the grim global pandemic: At long last, the world's largest dam removal is finally happening.
A young activist for a free-flowing Salween River. A team of campaigners and lawyers from EarthRights International joined Indigenous Karen communities on the Salween in 2018 to celebrate the International Day of Actions for Rivers on March 14. This year, EarthRights joined communities living in the Eu-Wae-Tta internally displaced persons camp for a celebration in solidarity with those impacted by dam projects on the Salween River. EarthRights International
<p>The dam removal project is a sign of the decline of the hydropower industry, whose fortunes have fallen as the <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-46098118" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">troubling</a> cost-benefit ratio of dams has become clear over the years. The rise of more cost-effective and sustainable energy sources (including wind and solar) has hastened this shift. This is exactly the type of progress envisioned by the <a href="https://www.yumpu.com/en/document/read/17023836/dams-and-development-a-new-framework-for-decision" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">World Commission on Dams</a> (WCD), a global multi-stakeholder body that was established by the World Bank and International Union for Conservation of Nature in 1998 to investigate the effectiveness and performance of large dams around the world. The WCD released a damning landmark <a href="https://www.un.org/press/en/2000/20001117.dam.pressconferencepm.doc.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">report</a> in November 2000 on the enormous financial, environmental and human costs and the dismal performance of large dams. The commission spent <a href="https://www.un.org/press/en/2000/20001117.dam.pressconferencepm.doc.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">two years</a> analyzing the outcome of the trillions of dollars invested in dams, reviewing dozens of case studies and testimonies from over a thousand communities and individuals, before producing the report.</p><p>But despite this progress, we cannot take hydropower's decline as inevitable. As governments around the world plan for a post-pandemic recovery, hydropower companies sense an opportunity. The industry is eager to recast itself as climate-friendly (<a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/how-green-is-hydropower-1919539525.html" target="_self">it's not</a>) and <a href="https://www.hydropower.org/covid-19" target="_blank">secure</a> precious stimulus funds to revive its dying industry — at the expense of people, the environment and a truly just, green recovery.</p>Hydropower’s Troubling Record
<p>The world's largest hydropower dam removal project on the Klamath River is a significant win for tribal communities. But while the Yurok and Karuk tribes <a href="https://www.karuk.us/images/docs/press/bring_salmon_home.php" target="_blank">suffered</a> terribly from the decline of the Klamath's fisheries, they were by no means alone in that experience. The environmental catastrophe that occurred along the Klamath River has been replicated all over the world since the global boom in hydropower construction <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/hydropower" target="_blank">began</a> early in the 20th century.</p><p>The rush to dam rivers has had huge consequences. After decades of rampant construction, only <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/05/worlds-free-flowing-rivers-mapped-hydropower/" target="_blank">37 percent of the world's rivers remain free-flowing</a>, according to <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1111-9" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">one study</a>. River fragmentation has <a href="https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article/70/4/330/5732594" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">decimated freshwater habitats and fish stocks</a>, threatening food security for millions of the world's most vulnerable people, and hastening the <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffopperman/2020/10/13/freshwater-wildlife-continues-to-decline-but-new-energy-trendlines-suggest-we-can-bend-that-curve/?sh=f9d175a61ee4" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">decline of other myriad freshwater species</a>, including mammals, birds and reptiles.</p><p>The communities that experienced the most harm from dams — whether in Asia, Latin America or Africa — often lacked political power and access. But that didn't stop grassroots movements from organizing and growing to fight for their rights and livelihoods. The people affected by dams began raising their voices, sharing their experiences and forging alliances across borders. By the 1990s, the public <a href="https://tinyurl.com/y55lnlst" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">outcry</a> against large dams had grown so loud that it finally led to the establishment of the WCD.</p><p>What the WCD found was stunning. While large dam projects had brought some economic benefits, they had also <a href="https://www.irn.org/wcd/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">forcibly displaced an estimated 40 to 80 million people in the 20th century alone</a>. To put that number into perspective, it is more than the current population of present-day <a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.POP.TOTL?locations=FR" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">France</a> or the <a href="https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.POP.TOTL?locations=GB" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">United Kingdom</a>. These people lost their lands and homes to dams, and often with no compensation.</p><p>Subsequent research has compounded that finding. A paper published in <a href="https://tinyurl.com/c7uznz" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Water Alternatives</a> revealed that globally, more than <a href="https://tinyurl.com/yxw8x7ab" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">470 million people living downstream from large dams</a> have faced significant impacts to their lives and livelihoods — much of it due to disruptions in water supply, which in turn harm the complex web of life that depends on healthy, free-flowing rivers. The WCD's findings, released in 2000, <a href="https://www.irn.org/wcd/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">identified</a> the importance of restoring rivers, compensating communities for their losses, and finding better energy alternatives to save rivers and ecosystems.</p>Facing a New Crisis
<p>Twenty years after the WCD uncovered a crisis along the world's rivers and recommended a new development path — one that advances community-driven development and protects freshwater resources — we find ourselves in the midst of another crisis. The global pandemic has hit us hard, with surging loss of life, unemployment and instability.</p><p>But as governments work to rebuild economies and create job opportunities in the coming years, we have a choice: Double down on the failed, outdated technologies that have harmed so many, or change course and use this transformative moment to rebuild our natural systems and uplift communities.</p><p>There are many reasons to fight for a green recovery. The climate is changing even <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-018-07586-5" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">faster</a> than expected, and some dams — especially those with reservoirs in hot climates — <a href="https://tinyurl.com/w6w29t8" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">have been found to emit more greenhouse gases than a fossil fuel power plant</a>. Other estimates have put global reservoirs' human-made greenhouse gas emissions each year on par with <a href="https://www.climatecentral.org/news/greenhouse-gases-reservoirs-fuel-climate-change-20745" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Canada's</a> total emissions.</p><p>Meanwhile, we now understand that healthy rivers and freshwater ecosystems play a <a href="https://www.environment.gov.au/system/files/resources/b55b1fe4-7d09-47af-96c4-6cbb5f106d4f/files/wetlands-role-carbon-cycle.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">critical role in regulating and storing carbon</a>. And at a time when <a href="https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/blog/2019/05/nature-decline-unprecedented-report/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">biodiversity loss is soaring</a>, anything we can do to <a href="https://academic.oup.com/bioscience/article/70/4/330/5732594" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">restore habitat is key</a>. But with <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/271996520_A_Global_Boom_in_Hydropower_dam_Construction" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">more than 3,700 major dams proposed or under construction</a> in the world (primarily in the Global South, with over <a href="https://news.mongabay.com/2020/08/more-than-500-dams-planned-inside-protected-areas-study/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">500 of these in protected areas</a>), according to a 2014 report — and the hydropower industry <a href="https://www.hydropower.org/covid-19" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">jockeying</a> for scarce stimulus dollars — we must act urgently.</p>Signs of Hope
<img lazy-loadable="true" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNTcxMzUyMS9vcmlnaW4ucG5nIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYxOTcyNTc3OX0.EbqBVPs2kjhrY5AqnZXOb_GX-s6pw4qyJmmeISzKA6U/img.png?width=980" id="a81d0" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="87bc79d69f72e9334a78da8e0355e6ae" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" data-width="1620" data-height="1068" />Fish catch at the Siphandone on the Mekong River, prior to the completion of the Don Sahong Dam. Pai Deetes / International Rivers
<p>So what would a strong, resilient and equitable recovery look like in the 21st century? Let's consider one example in Southeast Asia.</p><p>Running through six countries, the Mekong River is the world's 12th-longest river, which is home to one of the world's most biodiverse regions, and includes the world's <a href="https://www.worldwildlife.org/places/greater-mekong#" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">largest</a> inland fishery. Around <a href="https://tinyurl.com/y6jrarjo" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">80 percent of the nearly 65 million people</a> who live in the Lower Mekong River Basin depend on the river for their livelihoods, according to the Mekong River Commission. In 1994, Thailand built the Pak Mun Dam on a Mekong tributary. <a href="https://tinyurl.com/y5ekfp4h" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Six years later</a>, the <a href="https://tinyurl.com/yxcvs6up" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">WCD studied the dam's performance</a> and submitted its conclusions and recommendations as part of its final report in 2000. According to the WCD report, the Pak Mun Dam did not deliver the peaking energy service it was designed for, and it <a href="https://tinyurl.com/y38p3jaw" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">physically blocked a critical migration route</a> for a range of fish species that migrated annually to breeding grounds upstream in the Mun River Basin. Cut off from their customary habitat, fish stocks plummeted, and so did the livelihoods of the local people.</p><p>Neighboring Laos, instead of learning from this debacle, followed in Thailand's footsteps, <a href="https://tinyurl.com/y4eaxcq2" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">constructing two dams on the river's mainstem</a>, Xayaburi Dam, commissioned in 2019, and Don Sahong Dam, commissioned in 2020. But then a sign of hope appeared. In early 2020, just as the pandemic began to spread across the world, the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/20/cambodia-scraps-plans-for-mekong-hydropower-dams" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Cambodian government reconsidered its plans to build more dams on the Mekong</a>. The science was indisputable: A government-commissioned report showed that further dams would <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/may/16/leaked-report-warns-cambodias-biggest-dam-could-literally-kill-mekong-river" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">reduce the river's wild fisheries, threaten critically endangered Irrawaddy dolphins</a> and <a href="https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/2013WR014651" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">block nutrient-rich sediment from the delta's fertile agricultural lands</a>.</p><p><a href="https://data.opendevelopmentmekong.net/dataset/4f1bb5fd-a564-4d37-878b-c288af460143/resource/5f6fe360-7a68-480d-9ba4-12d7b8b805c9/download/volume-3_solar-alternative-to-sambor-dam.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Studies</a> show that Cambodia didn't need to seek billions of dollars in loans to build more hydropower; instead, it could pursue more cost-effective solar and wind projects that would deliver needed electricity at a fraction of the cost — and <a href="https://www.worldwildlife.org/press-releases/wwf-statement-on-cambodian-government-s-decision-to-suspend-hydropower-dam-development-on-the-mekong-river" target="_blank">without the ecological disasters to fisheries and the verdant Mekong delta</a>. And, in a stunning reversal, Cambodia listened to the science — and to the people — and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/mar/20/cambodia-scraps-plans-for-mekong-hydropower-dams" target="_blank">announced</a> a 10-year moratorium on mainstream dams. Cambodia is now <a href="https://www.voanews.com/east-asia-pacific/cambodia-halts-hydropower-construction-mekong-river-until-2030" target="_blank">reconsidering</a> its energy mix, recognizing that mainstream hydropower dams are too costly and undermine the economic and cultural values of its flagship river.</p>Toward a Green Recovery
<img lazy-loadable="true" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNTcxMzUwOS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY1MTMwMjk0M30.0LZCOEVzgtgjm2_7CwcbFfuZlrtUr80DiRYxqKGaKIg/img.jpg?width=980" id="87fe9" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="e6b9bfeb013516f6ad5033bb9e03c5ec" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" data-width="2100" data-height="3086" />Klamath River Rapids. Tupper Ansel Blake / U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
<p>Increasingly, governments, civil servants and the public at large are rethinking how we produce energy and are seeking to preserve and restore precious freshwater resources. Dam removals are increasing exponentially across <a href="https://www.americanrivers.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/DamsRemoved_1999-2019.pdf" target="_blank">North America</a> and <a href="https://damremoval.eu/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/DRE-policy-Report-2018-digitaal-010319.pdf" target="_blank">Europe</a>, and movements advancing <a href="https://www.rightsofrivers.org/" target="_blank">permanent river protection are growing across Latin America, Asia and Africa</a>.</p><p>We must use the COVID-19 crisis to accelerate the trend. Rather than relying on old destructive technologies and industry claims of newfound "<a href="https://www.hydrosustainability.org/news/2020/11/12/consultation-on-a-groundbreaking-global-sustainability-standard-for-hydropower" target="_blank">sustainable hydropower</a>," the world requires a new paradigm for an economic recovery that is rooted both in climate and economic justice as well as river stewardship. Since December 2020, hundreds of groups and individuals from more than 80 countries have joined the <a href="https://www.rivers4recovery.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Rivers4Recovery</a> call for a better way forward for rivers and natural places. This paradigm will protect our rivers as critical lifelines — supporting fisheries, biodiversity, water supply, food production, Indigenous peoples and diverse populations around the world — rather than damming and polluting them.</p><p>The promise of the Klamath dam removals is one of restoration — a move that finally recognizes the immense value of free-flowing rivers and the key role they play in <a href="https://f.hubspotusercontent20.net/hubfs/4783129/LPR/PDFs/Living_Planet_Report_Freshwater_Deepdive.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">nourishing both the world's biodiversity and hundreds of millions of people</a>. Healthy rivers — connected to watershed forests, floodplains, wetlands and deltas — are key partners in building resilience in the face of an accelerating climate crisis. But if we allow the hydropower industry to succeed in its <a href="https://www.world-energy.org/article/12361.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">cynical grab for stimulus funds</a>, we'll only perpetuate the 20th century's legacy of suffering and environmental degradation.</p><p>We must put our money where our values are. Twenty years ago, the WCD pointed the way forward to a model of development that takes humans, wildlife and the environment into account, and in 2020, we saw that vision flower along the Klamath River. It's time to bring that promise of healing and restoration to more of the world's rivers.</p><p><em>Deborah Moore is a former commissioner of the <a href="https://www.water-alternatives.org/index.php/alldoc/articles/vol3/v3issue2/79-a3-2-2/file" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="">World Commission on Dams</a>. Michael Simon was a member of the <a href="https://www.hydrosustainability.org/assessment-protocol" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="">Hydropower Sustainability Assessment Forum</a>. Darryl Knudsen is the executive director of <a href="https://www.internationalrivers.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" style="">International Rivers</a>.</em></p><p><em>This article first appeared on <a href="https://truthout.org/articles/damming-rivers-is-terrible-for-human-rights-ecosystems-and-food-security/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Truthout</a> and was produced in partnership with <a href="https://independentmediainstitute.org/earth-food-life/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Earth | Food | Life</a>, a project of the Independent Media Institute.</em></p>EcoWatch Daily Newsletter
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