A "fish-friendly" turbine being considered for installation at Brookfield Power's School Street facility in Cohoes, NY. Engineers say each power generating dam has different circumstances, so there's no one-size-fits-all solution. (Image courtesy of Brookfield Power)
There’s a strong push to develop clean energy sources. Dams can generate clean power,
but they have a bad reputation for harming fish. Mark Brush reports a new water turbine
design could help some dams become more ‘fish friendly’:
Transcript
There’s a strong push to develop clean energy sources. Dams can generate clean power,
but they have a bad reputation for harming fish. Mark Brush reports a new water turbine
design could help some dams become more ‘fish friendly’:
Power generating dams can affect fish in two ways. First, they block fish from
swimming upstream. Second, some turbines can kill close to 20% of the fish that pass
through them. Now, engineers are working on the second problem. They’ve developed a new
turbine that will help fish make the trip downstream.
Brad Strickler is a project manager for the Wanapum Dam on the Columbia River. This
dam is one of the first to install these so-called ‘fish friendly’ turbines. He says the
turbines have fewer blades:
“You say ‘what will the fish see differently in there?’ He’s not going to see places where
perhaps he can get caught in some sort of wedge shaped gap. We eliminated all of that
on this design.”
Stickler says the turbines have cut down on the number of fish killed – while at the same
time increasing their power output.
For the Environment Report, I’m Mark Brush.