Whooshh 1

Whooshh 1

David Sparks Ph.D.
David Sparks Ph.D.
Fish species are affected by the development and operation of dams. Dams without adequate fish passage systems block migrating up stream adults from reaching critical habitat. For downstream juveniles, a substantial proportion can be killed while migrating through dams, both directly through collisions with structures and abrupt pressure changes during passage through turbines and spillways, and indirectly,through non-fatal injury and disorientation. Dams also cause increased travel times for juveniles to migrate downstream due to disruption of natural flowing rivers.

 

Vincent Bryan discusses the problems with dams. “Hydropower had really gotten a bad rap over the years because of the environmental impact which primarily came back to the fish. There was an effect that dams had on the runs. We are particularly good at going up and in many of the situations where they had fish ladders in the past, that was not a viable solution. Certainly in Idaho where you are, that is very much the case. We are not starting with the 300 to 500 foot dams but in theory, there is no reason that we cannot do that. It really just comes down to finding what is best for the fish. Our live testing has brought the fish 250 feet and we feel pretty good about that.” Tomorrow we will learn how Whooshh whooshes fish like salmon up and over barricades in a river like dams.

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