Listeners of the podcast will remember a number of dam-focused episodes over the past few years, Free the Ocklawaha (Florida) and Snake River Dams (Idaho, Columbia River basin) to name just two. But the issue of dams – the blocking of the arterial systems of the earth – is not about just a few high-profile cases. More than 800,000 dams across the planet have destroyed river systems, extirpated vast runs of native fish, displaced millions of human beings and drowned priceless farmlands, forests, prairies and wetlands. The delusion that we can plug living river systems and somehow turn them into money has perverted politics and economies and stolen the wealth of nations, hoarding it into the hands of the privileged and well-connected few. The story of dams – an incredible tale of careless hubris, blatant corruption and tragically bad ideas – is one Steven Hawley has been chronicling its unfolding for decades now, long enough to see a new clarity rising, and with it a growing movement to remove old dams and restore the free-flowing energies and arterial systems of our planet. Hawley’s new book, Cracked: The Future of Dams in a Hot, Chaotic World, chronicles this history and future. Each success (and there are many of them) brings into stark focus the path forward, restoring rivers and fish runs and floodplains, reawakening the deep relationship between humankind and the waters that sustain us. Join Hal and Steven for a spirited exploration of one of the most critical issues of our time.
Books mentioned in this podcast episode:
· Donald Worster, Rivers of Empire: Water, Aridity, and the Growth of the American West
· John McPhee, Encounters with the Archdruid
· John McPhee, The Control of Nature
· David Gessner, All the Wild that Remains
· Kate Brown, Plutopia
· Brad Dimock, Cort Conley, and Vince Welch, The Doing of the Thing: The Brief, Brilliant Whitewater Career of Buzz Holmstrom
· Paul VanDevelder, Coyote Warrior: One Man, Three Tribes, and the Trial That Forged a Nation, Second Edition
· Marc Reisner, Cadillac Desert
· Gerry Spence, From Freedom into Slavery
· Dick Wilson, White Indian Boy: My Life among the Shoshones
· Other mentions, C. S. Lewis, Todd Snider
If you are interested in purchasing the book, get it at the link below:
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