WATER ABLAZE - Patagonia Sin Represas

Worldwide, there are 40,000 huge dams. In addition to their
disastrous social consequences – the resettlement of millions of people
and, in some cases, the depopulation of entire regions – these dams are
having an extremely detrimental effect on water supplies. As a result
of the largely extended surface areas of reservoirs, millions of cubic
metres of fresh water are being lost through evaporation and the lower
reaches of rivers are carrying less and less water. An additional problem
lies in the fact that the rivers are no longer able to purify themselves
and the toxic substances they contain are deposited behind the dam
walls. Sooner or later it will become crucial to reduce the size of these
dams.
Vast projects such as the Ilisu Dam in Turkey are only made
possible through German export subsidies like the ones granted by
the KfW bank, government export credit guarantees or contracts of
suretyship with other nations. This is why protests against these large
dam-building schemes must be mobilised even further at international
level. In India, work is being carried out on the Narmada Dam
system, which is one of the world’s largest water-related construction
projects. The centrepiece is the Sardor-Sarovar Dam, against which the
inhabitants of more than 245 villages, due to be inundated, are putting
up fierce resistance.
The Three Gorges Dam in China (photo: Wikimedia Commons)
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