Outline The Environmental And Social Effects Of Hydropower

The development of hydroelectric power has had a significant impact on communities all over the world, both socially, economically, politically, and environmentally. As the largest hydroelectric producer in the world, no country has felt these consequences as intensely as China. At the end of the 20th century, rapid economic and population growth left China struggling to supply electricity for its quickly growing needs, while simultaneously attempting to protect its economy against the consequences of such rapid growth (Yergin, 221). Once a significant exporter of coal, the country quickly became one of the world’s largest importers. The 11th Five-Year Plan, which specified for non-fossil fuel as 15% of primary energy consumption and a 40-45%

And the drawbacks didn’t stop there. The dam also represented environmental degradation at its worst, from erosion and landslides to waste and habitat fragmentation. It affected the water of surrounding communities, uprooted over 1.3 million people, and submerged archaeological and cultural sites. The Three Gorges Project, despite its huge energy capacity, low operating cost, reduction of emissions, and flood control, divided both citizens and politicians. This paper sets out to outline the environmental, economic, political, and social effects of hydropower, using the Three Gorges Project as a case study. It hopes that by using this project as a framework for future hydropower development, it will provide a useful reference for sustainable and beneficial hydropower development in China’s

Indeed, the creation of dams has undisputedly been linked to erosion and sedimentation. By disrupting the flow of sediment and nutrients to the sea, dams can seriously impact neighboring river and seacoast ecosystems. It has been shown that the Yangtze River, the fifth largest river in the world and the fourth largest river in terms of sediment discharge, has been seriously impacted over the past five decades by the creation of reservoirs and dams (Yang). During the project, 80% of the land in the area was experiencing erosion, depositing millions of tons of sediment into the Yangtze annually (Qing). The slower flow caused by dams forces sediment to settle, lessening aquatic biodiversity and exposing downstream areas to flooding. In the case of TGD, it is expected that the delta will be eroded significantly during the first five decades of operation, leading to coastal erosion of the Changjiang delta (the richest and most developed area in China) and disruption to the ecosystems in the Changjiang estuary and adjacent sea (Yang). Additionally, the collection of sediment in the reservoir threatens the stability of the dam itself and lessens its capacity to produce power. Mitigation strategies related to this accumulation, ironically, often involve the building of additional dams upstream to slow the buildup