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Commentaries and editorials

Dams Should Be Going Up,
Not Coming Out

by Travis Williams
Sequim Gazette, July 21, 2021

Water runs through spillway gates of Lower Monumental Dam on the Lower Snake River in southeastern Washington. Well, here we are: No dams, and our snowmelt running into the Strait -- instead of generating electricity and being collected and used by our farmers during hot summer spells. And how long can our farmers draw from their ground-water wells before it also affects water supply for homes in the area? And how will the E.P.A. regulate these resources?

Also, with the shortage of snow in the Cascade Mountains, how long will it be before we are paying exorbitant rates for the electric power we buy from sources like Energy Northwest? They too will be affected by any droughts. Also, with global warming, if not stopped, our glaciers will soon disappear, and nothing will remain to store rainwater in the mountains.

Dams will be the only way to catch the winter snow-water, or rains, if that is all that falls.

It has long been known that dams produce the "cleanest” and "cheapest” power that can be provided. So shouldn’t we be building more and larger dams (like the Chinese) for the future, not tearing them out?

This now pervasive short-sighted thinking is certainly not the "progress” our country was built on.

When we let the tribes, Fish & Wildlife and environmentalists spout their high-minded blather and decide our future, we are in big trouble.

With global warming and populations expanding worldwide -- dream on -- if you don’t think there will be a world water shortage.


Travis Williams, Sequim
Dams Should Be Going Up, Not Coming Out
Sequim Gazette, July 21, 2021

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