Thirty-nine dams around the Great Lakes region will be removed in the coming year. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jonathan Ahl reports:
Transcript
Thirty-nine dams around the Great Lakes region will be removed in the coming year. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jonathan Ahl reports:
The removals are part of a nationwide effort to remove 63 dams that are in poor condition or have outlived their intended purposes. Environmental groups are hailing the move. Eric Eckl is a spokesman for American Rivers. He says removing dams will have numerous positive effects:
“The removal of these dams will start their return to health. It can improve water quality, it can cause the fisheries in the river to rebound, it can create new types of recreational opportunities there.”
Eckl also says the cause safety problems because they create drowning hazards and are at risk of collapsing. He says while the large number of dams scheduled for removal is an encouraging sign, there are still thousands of aging dams in the Great Lakes region that should be removed as soon as possible.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Jonathan Ahl.