Over the past 100 years, we have dammed or added locks on multiple streams and rivers for a variety of purposes including recreation, hydropower, irrigation, flood control, barge traffic and water storage.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has catalogued at least 90,000 dams greater than six feet tall that are blocking our rivers and streams. Of course, there are tens of thousands of additional small dams that fall through the cracks of our national inventory.
Today, "Remove That Dam or Lock" has become a watchword for people all over the country who want to remove unneeded, unwanted and unnecessary dams and locks. In 2021, according to conservation organization American Rivers, 57 dams were removed reconnecting more than 2,131 miles of rivers. Since 1912, over 2,000 dams have been taken down. In addition, American Rivers is highlighting 25 dam removals to watch for 2022.
In Arkansas, a partially breached dam on Little Sugar Creek in Bentonville is a target for removal in 2022. The Little Sugar Creek Dam was washed out several years back, and a group is trying to stop it from being rebuilt. They point out that to rebuild the poorly constructed dam would take several million dollars. They want to clean up the debris from the partially destroyed dam and let Little Sugar Creek flow free.
Removing dams has tremendous benefits for a river's health, public safety and climate resilience, according to a report released by American Rivers. The report also highlights the 25 dam removals to watch for 2022 and beyond. The following states are leading the rush to remove dams: Vermont, Pennsylvania and Oregon with seven removals each; and New Jersey with six removals.
But not only do we have too many dams, we have hundreds which are oversized. A brief history of large, oversized dams in the United States shows that in the 50s, 60s and 70s, we dammed literally thousands of streams and rivers. Many of these dams were totally unnecessary, and most of them were much larger than needed.
We stopped "Lake Buffalo" but we should have stopped many more ill-conceived projects, or at least reduced their size. While dams can benefit society, they also cause considerable harm to rivers and streams.
According to American Rivers, dams deplete fisheries, degraded river ecosystems and alter recreational opportunities. Today, many dams are now old, unsafe or no longer serving their intended purposes. Although not all dams damage rivers in exactly the same way, they prevent fish migration and access to spawning habitat. Dams also change the rivers natural flow, which fish such as salmon and river herring depend on steady flows to guide them. They create stagnant reservoir pools, disorient migrating fish and can significantly increase the duration of their migration.
Dams can also alter the timing of water flows. Some hydropower dams, for example, withhold and then release water to generate power for peak demand periods. They can trap sediment, burying rock river beds where fish spawn. Gravel, logs and other important food and habitat features can also become trapped behind dams. Peaking power operations can cause dramatic changes in reservoir water levels. This can leave stretches below dams completely de-watered, and can lead to algal blooms and decreased oxygen levels. Dams also decrease water temperatures by releasing cooled, oxygen-deprived water from the reservoir bottom.
Arkansas has a number of large dams and most of the big ones are commonly known as The Corps of Engineers Dinosaur Dams. They are huge and it seems that the Corps worked on the concept that bigger is better. Remember the "Keep Busy" signs in the political cartoons? These whopper dams are Arkansas's answer to the Egyptian Pyramids. It seems not only do we have a vast number of unnecessary dams, we have many that are too large and have unnecessarily submerged thousands of acres of bottom land hardwood trees for very little benefit.
If we analyze the amount of impounded water and submerged land, and then consider the benefits and then the negatives, wouldn't a dam half the size been sufficient? Yes. Most of the time, if the advantages the large amount of impounded water of the dam were reduced by 50%, it would have almost the same benefits. What are we going to do with that much impounded water? Build a pipeline to California?
Of course, when we study the dam problems, we should consider the waste of money putting navigational locks for barge traffic on a river such as the Ouachita, which is too small to be a navigable waterway, is. Just think, if we had never put a navigational lock on the Ouachita River for barge traffic, we would have saved hundreds of millions of dollars, and maybe the Ouachita River would today be a twin to the Buffalo and be a national free-flowing river.
That may sound as if I'm stretching a point, but if you have ever fished or boated up Champagnolle Creek, you might understand how the Ouachita River might look if there had never been a dam or lock on it south of Arkadelphia.
In 1805, Hunter and Dunbar traversed the river ending up in Hot Springs. Hunter's journal describes a river that is more similar to the Buffalo than the lock and dammed river we have today.
The locks on the Ouachita River were installed for barge traffic, which raised the overall water level on the river to the point where barges could move up the river as far as Camden. However, since there hasn't been barge traffic on the river for years, removing some of the locks would be beneficial to not only the ecosystem in the river, but to restore a fishery and increase the bottomland hardwood.
The damage to the river which was caused by the Felsenthal locks has diminished the fishery, flooded and killed 50,000 acres of hardwood timber and caused tremendous bank erosion. The bank erosion has caused thousands of trees to topple into the river. The Felsenthal locks should be removed and the water level be returned to its pre-Felsenthal lock condition.
While it would be too disruptive to completely remove all the downriver locks, the reduction of the above noted lock down to the pre-Felsenthal level would bring back former Wildcat Lake and Pete Wilson's Slough, which would return this adjacent section of the river to the best fishery in the mid-south. This drop in water level would also allow the restoration of bottomland hardwood and stop the bank erosion. It would also save approximately $9 million a year in dredging and cleaning up of the river.
There is no barge traffic on the Ouachita above Monroe, Louisiana and there never will be. The Corp of Engineers should pull the pins on the lower downriver Felsenthal lock, walk away, and give us back our river.
Note: This is a message to the Corp of Engineers and to the Arkansas Waterways Commission: "Give us back our river! Remove the pins from the Felsenthal Locks, and let the river return to its pre-Felsenthal lock banks."
If you want to help encourage officials to removed the locks, here are some email addresses: [email protected]; [email protected]. A "Free the Ouachita! Remove the Locks!" bumper sticker is also available. Just send me your mailing address.
Richard Mason is an author and speaker. He can be reached at [email protected].