10-17-2008, 11:59 AM
I know a guy who runs a multi-room bed and breakfast on hydropower with no utility hook-up. First, it took him 3 years to get the permits. Second, he has a 60 foot waterfall in his back yard. Do you know how rare that is? Third, sometimes when there has been no rain or too much rain has washed away his collection pipes, he has to run a generator.
There is a school of thought that says hydropower is not green. Many beautiful valleys have been inundated to build hydropower dams. The organic matter that collects at the bottom of such reservoirs decays and emits methane which is worse than CO2. Gotta admit I don't know how a hydropower reservoir is worse than a natural lake in this regard though. Anyway to make hydropower work you have to take a river that was doing its own thing before and put it on a leash. Practically speaking there will be some environmental consequences from this. Big dams ruin spawning runs. Who will be the judge as to whether your small backyard system is having an unsatisfactory impact on the environment? Emotionally, there would be some PETA types who would object to altering the river at all.
There is a school of thought that says hydropower is not green. Many beautiful valleys have been inundated to build hydropower dams. The organic matter that collects at the bottom of such reservoirs decays and emits methane which is worse than CO2. Gotta admit I don't know how a hydropower reservoir is worse than a natural lake in this regard though. Anyway to make hydropower work you have to take a river that was doing its own thing before and put it on a leash. Practically speaking there will be some environmental consequences from this. Big dams ruin spawning runs. Who will be the judge as to whether your small backyard system is having an unsatisfactory impact on the environment? Emotionally, there would be some PETA types who would object to altering the river at all.