dams

Judge denies Humane Society injunction, OKs sea-lion trapping

Denying an injunction sought by the Humane Society, a federal judge has given the go-ahead to Oregon and Washington state officials to trap and kill salmon-gobbling sea lions near the Columbia River’s Bonneville Dam. The animal-rights group sued after the National Marine Fisheries Service OK’d sea-lion culling last month. An official hearing on the Humane […]

Western states look into building new dams

Concerned about climate-caused drought, officials in at least six Western states are looking into building new dams to create rain-capturing reservoirs — even as dams across the country are being torn down over environmental concerns.

Mining CEO loves gold, hates fish

Having trouble finding a Grinch this Christmas season?

Try Cynthia Carroll, CEO of Anglo-American Mining Company. Carroll's company has teamed up with Northern Dynasty (like the television show Dynasty, only eviler) to build the world's biggest dam in Alaska so she can mine piles of gold, which will have the unfortunate impact of destroying the world's largest salmon fishery. Not only will the dam prevent the salmon from reaching their spawning grounds, the cyanide Carroll uses to extract gold from rock will likely seep into the river, ruining the salmon's sense of smell, which is vital to them finding their way, if it doesn't just kill them outright. In fairness, Carroll apparently needs something with which to re-gild her toilet.

Unfortunately, Carroll's need for a soft, shiny, yellow resting area for her derriere has a price: the elimination of the world's largest sockeye salmon fishery might keep rappers rolling in bling and allow central bankers to keep using words like "bullion," but it's also going to imperil grizzly bears, bald eagles and the many other creatures that rely on the salmon, not to mention the Native people who traditionally rely on the salmon fishery for food. Oh, and it will threaten to put many of Alaska's commercial salmon fishermen out of business, which will mean the end of the world's only major supplier of sustainably caught, non-toxic wild salmon. On the other hand, Carroll would look totally powerful with that sceptered orb she's been craving.

The damming question

It's been 50 years since Celilo Falls in Oregon was buried by the Dalles Dam to create 800 megawatts of power, but the memory of the great salmon runs lost live on through the tribes who migrated again this year to the spot to mourn the day. Orion Grassroots Network member group Save Our Wild Salmon opined eloquently in the Oregonian this week about the choices our society made for green power.

David James Duncan rows through a wheat field to save salmon — and we’ve got pictures

Photo: Frederic Ohlinger “The miracle meal after the Sermon on the Mount was both loaves and fishes,” says author and storyteller David James Duncan. “Not one or the other. Both.” It’s a sentiment that helps to explain why Duncan and a variety of compatriots were photographed in 13 colorful dories, rowing and casting lines — […]

In China, Yu Xiaogang is helping locals fight back against dams

China has spent decades trying to harness its powerful river systems with dams. Enormous hydroelectric projects, most notably the Three Gorges Dam now under construction on the Yangtze River, have devastated local economies and ecosystems. Yu Xiaogang. Photo: Goldman Environmental Prize. Chinese environmentalist Yu Xiaogang, founder of the group Green Watershed, says the people harmed […]

Jacques Leslie’s Deep Water sheds light on dam dramas

What does hell look like to an environmentalist? In the classic Encounters With the Archdruid, writer John McPhee imagines this particular inferno. The outer ring, he writes, is a moat filled with DDT. Inside lies another moat brimming with burning gasoline, and still deeper are masses of bulldozers and chainsaws. In the middle — at […]

Little-known facts from a country on the edge of your consciousness

293,966 — population of Iceland3 4,117,827 — population of Kentucky2 10 — percentage of Icelanders who believe elves “definitely” exist4 0 — number of successful elf surveys conducted in Kentucky 11.5 — percentage of Iceland that is covered by glaciers1 3,240 — square miles covered by the largest glacier, Vatnajökull1 2 — tectonic plates visible […]

An interview with risk-taking park ranger Jordan Fisher Smith, author of Nature Noir

If you had to guess which federal agents in the U.S. face the greater danger, who would you put your money on: the officers who wage the endless War on Drugs, or the rangers who patrol the green acres of the national parks? Well, it's the rangers. According to a 2001 study by the Bureau of Justice, nature's security guards are twice as likely to be assaulted on the job as agents with the Drug Enforcement Administration.