Comments on: Canada Boosting Hydro Power to 88.5 GW to Replace US Coal http://cleantechnica.com/2011/11/16/canada-boosting-hydro-power-to-88-5-gw-to-replace-us-coal/ Clean Tech News & Views: Solar Energy News. Wind Energy News. EV News. & More. Tue, 30 Dec 2014 01:40:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=4.0.1 By: Susan Kraemer http://cleantechnica.com/2011/11/16/canada-boosting-hydro-power-to-88-5-gw-to-replace-us-coal/#comment-107630 Fri, 18 Nov 2011 08:32:00 +0000 http://cleantechnica.com/?p=32226#comment-107630 I agree, it really seems to be a solvable issue – hardly on the order of nuclear waste, say.

]]> By: Anonymous http://cleantechnica.com/2011/11/16/canada-boosting-hydro-power-to-88-5-gw-to-replace-us-coal/#comment-107620 Thu, 17 Nov 2011 21:28:00 +0000 http://cleantechnica.com/?p=32226#comment-107620 It’s not a ground-shaking amount of generation, but the US Department of Agriculture has made some funds available to convert four existing dams to power producers.

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2011/11/u-s-awards-rural-energy-funds-to-hydro-projects-in-four-states

We’ve got thousands of existing dams in the US which likely could be converted from irrigation/transportation/flood control use to also producing electricity. A few existing dams have recently been converted.

http://greeninc.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/19/retrofitting-non-electctric-dams-for-power/

It’s nice seeing progress being made on so many fronts. If we get the rate up we might make it before we bake ourselves out of existence.

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BTW, methane does not need to be an issue. Some years back a new dam was put in place in the Sierra foothills where I lived. The to-be-flooded area was marked and opened up for firewood cutting. Most of the large wood was removed and the remaining branches were burned in place.

The waste could have been chipped and used for biomass or compost, but this was ‘back then’.

]]> By: Gregory Nisco http://cleantechnica.com/2011/11/16/canada-boosting-hydro-power-to-88-5-gw-to-replace-us-coal/#comment-107618 Thu, 17 Nov 2011 21:20:00 +0000 http://cleantechnica.com/?p=32226#comment-107618 This is great news, especially the fact that newly covered lands will produce less methane in colder climates. The coal power plants need to be replaced as soon as possible by lower CO2 sources. I wonder if they are also looking at upgrading the transmission lines as part of the plan to export more hydroelectric power to the United States.

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