A Polekol representative participated in the Free Flow conference in Groningen, where 450 participants exchanged experiences, knowledge and plans for freeing watercourses from harmful obstacles.
When someone in our country or region says that they are ready to remove a dam from a river, it rings in the public like a war cry worthy of an epic fantasy. Whether it evokes sympathy and the impression that the speaker is a supernaturally brave person ready to die for nature – or antipathies and the readiness to label the speaker an eco-terrorist, an obstacle to progress and a foreign traitor – the very mention of “removing the tube from the river” seems like a promise that is difficult to fulfill or a radical threat.
Those in the region who dare to prevent natural watercourses from being blocked by hydrotechnical facilities, mainly small hydroelectric plants, can expect that, like the women of Kruščica, they will be beaten by the special police, that they will break their hands in a physical confrontation with the investor-devastator, like the president of MZ Rakita Desko Stojanović, that they will be (“a little”) kidnapped, like the TV crew that tried to document the dry bed of the Rupska river at Ostrozub, that they will freeze for months on guard to prevent the construction of a completely illegal building; to threaten them, to receive SLAPP lawsuits as young activists for saving the Kasindol river or “ordinary” misdemeanor and criminal lawsuits, no matter how much law and justice are on their side.
The Free Flow conference gathered over 450 experts
With that experience, it is unusual to go to an international meeting dedicated to the successful removal of dams from watercourses; moreover, the gathering celebrated the removal of over 500 barriers that harmed the ecosystems of the European continent, as many as were removed in 2023.
The Polekol delegation participated in exactly such a summit in Groningen in mid-April. In this city in the north of the Netherlands, more than four hundred and fifty activists, biologists, hydrologists and experts in the field of technique and technology gathered as part of the conference called Free Flow. The goals of the conference were to exchange experiences from previous work on removing obstacles and restoring river ecosystems, information on plans and strategies, as well as knowledge from the field of monitoring the process of planning, removing and restoring ecosystems.
Experts and activists are supported in this by independent civil society organizations, and in some cases by national and local administrations. It is important to emphasize that the European Union itself plans to restore the entire 25,000 kilometers of watercourses. They found out that this is necessary “in the West” the hard way – thanks to the fact that in many regions and countries the biodiversity of rivers and surrounding territories has been completely destroyed due to industrialization and urbanization. “The Guidance on Barrier removal for river restoration”, a study by the European Commission, shows that on average there are barriers on rivers in the EU every kilometer and a half. There are about one million two hundred thousand of them. According to the study AMBER – Adaptive Management of Barriers in European Rivers, the rivers of the European continent are the most fragmented in the world. About 1,250 obstacles are located in protected areas, and as many as 150,000 obstacles are considered unnecessary, mainly due to obsolescence.
According to the Dam Removal Europe coalition, a coalition of seven environmental groups, including WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature) and The Nature Conservancy (TNC), dams and other obstacles disrupt the continuity of ecosystems and adversely affect populations of river animals, many of which are already endangered. Several studies published in the past few years have shed light on the extent of this problem. Thus, for example, WWF’s Living Planet Report study showed that the populations of almost 70% of bird, amphibian, fish and reptile species have decreased compared to 1970. Migratory fish populations in the EU declined by 93% in the same period, and 42% of freshwater fish species are endangered today.
Removing the dams is economically justified
Programs for the removal of dams and other obstacles have been developed over the past twenty years. Although the enthusiasm and idealism of activists and scientists are key to their implementation, the cooperation provided by institutions is motivated, as always, by ultimate economic practicality. Namely, if the further collapse of ecosystems across Europe is allowed, the loss of biodiversity will have an additional negative impact on profitable activities such as agriculture, and governments will require even more expensive technical measures to protect the population from the consequences of the climate crisis than healthy ecosystems are able to provide.
At the Free Flow conference, we confirmed that most often old obstacles are removed, but also inefficient hydropower plants that continue to collect subsidies.
WWF, one of the members of the coalition, states that by removing the dams: restores the continuity of river flows and restores their ecological function, preserves fish species populations, improves water quality (the water of faster flows is cooler, contains more oxygen and is more resistant to eutrophication). In addition, the restoration of natural streams reduces the risks of droughts and shortages of drinking water, as well as the costs of maintaining unnecessary dams and adapting them to safety standards.
Precisely for practical reasons, the EU adopted the Green Deal and the EU Biodiversity Strategy 2030, one of the goals of which is to restore at least 25,000 km of free river flows in the Union by 2030 by removing barriers and restoring floodplains. This is also the goal of the Proposed Law on the Restoration of Nature, which the European Parliament (in one of the rounds of voting) voted positively at the beginning of March 2024. In addition to reforestation, this agreement on the law includes the revitalization of wetlands and the return of rivers to a free-flowing state, as part of the program for the restoration of all endangered ecosystems in the EU by 2050.
More than 500 obstacles removed from European rivers in 2023
During the Free Flow conference, 125 speakers addressed the audience, whose presentations were divided into thematic units. We learned, among other things, that out of the mentioned 500 obstacles last year, the most dams, 156, were removed by France. Slightly less was removed by Spain, Sweden and Denmark. In total, 50% more obstacles were removed than the previous year.
Not building unnecessary obstacles is much cheaper than building them, thereby causing damage to the economy and settlements, it was emphasized at the conference. As domestic activists have been trying to explain for a decade and a half, it is cheaper than wasting money and time on their demolition in the future.
In addition, the removal of obstacles does not imply their simple demolition. Each removal requires extensive preparations: projects of the existing condition, demolition projects, work notifications, engagement of labor and mechanization… An important segment of barrier removal is the assessment of the status of the river sediment that settles above each dam, which cannot just be allowed to be carried away by the water (like a Lada shell).
Scientists and representatives of some of the sponsors of the conference presented modern technologies for calculations and projects to remove obstacles, as well as AI software for evaluating ecosystem restoration.
The socio-political aspect was also discussed, with a strong emphasis on the rights of local communities. While representatives of organizations from previously industrialized countries considered the fact that some local communities are against the removal of old dams that have acquired cultural-historical status, Podstavnica Polekola introduced those interested to the real war against rivers and activists that is being waged in Serbia and the region.
Cover photo: © Arthur de Bruin Soca Slovenia