In 2015, nearly every country on Earth signed the Paris Agreement, pledging to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Achieving that goal means slashing greenhouse gas emissions fast. For many governments, one of the most attractive solutions has been hydropower. It’s low-carbon, renewable, and already proven at scale. On paper, it looks like a win. Since the Paris Agreement, hydropower has seen renewed global investment. Developing countries, especially those with major rivers, have leaned heavily into dam construction. Multilateral banks and private investors see it as a stable, long-term energy source that ticks the climate box. But the picture isn’t as clean as it seems.
Hydropower generates electricity by using the energy of flowing water, typically from dammed rivers. It produces no direct carbon emissions, doesn’t rely on fossil fuels, and can provide consistent base-load power. In theory, it helps meet climate targets without the volatility of solar or wind. The problem lies in everything that hydropower development disrupts. Building a dam is not a minor intervention. It floods land, reroutes rivers, displaces communities, and alters entire ecosystems. The larger the project, the more dramatic the consequences.
In countries across Asia, Africa, and Latin America, villages have been uprooted to make way for reservoirs. People lose homes, farmland, and access to rivers that support their way of life. Resettlement is often poorly managed, with inadequate compensation and long-term social dislocation. In Laos and Cambodia, thousands have been displaced by mega-dams with little recourse or support. In Guatemala, local resistance to hydro projects has even led to violence and repression. This isn’t just a few isolated cases. The World Commission on Dams estimates that tens of millions of people worldwide have been displaced by dam projects over the last century.
Rivers are lifelines for biodiversity. Damming them interrupts the natural flow of water, sediment, and nutrients. It fragments habitats, blocks fish migrations, and drowns forests and wetlands. In the Mekong River Basin, one of the most biodiverse freshwater ecosystems in the world, a cascade of dam projects has caused fish populations to collapse and farming downstream to suffer from trapped sediment. Even smalller projects can destabilize fragile environments. Altering a river’s seasonal patterns, even slightly, can throw off entire ecological cycles.
It’s important to recognize that hydropower isn’t just a climate solution. It’s also a giant global industry with billions in play. Projects are often pushed forward with promises of development and energy security, but the social and environmental costs are routinely downplayed. Communities opposing dams are often labeled as anti-progress. Environmental concerns are brushed aside in the rush for renewable energy. This industry mindset creates a blind spot. In the drive to meet climate targets, some governments and investors ignore the very real damage hydropower can cause. It’s climate action without accountability.
What gets labeled a climate solution in one part of the world often looks very different on the ground elsewhere. Hydropower may help cut carbon emissions, but for the communities who lose their land, and for the ecosystems that collapse under rising reservoirs, it’s not a solution, but a threat. The world urgently needs action on climate change, but urgency is not a license to bulldoze through communities and nature. The effects of so-called clean energy projects need to be judged not just by their carbon footprint but by their full human and environmental cost.
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