Not only are Third World nations penalized by trendy anti-dam policies, but so are First World communities with flood protection issues dams can solve best, like Sacramento.
An excerpt.
Don't Ditch Dams, World Bank Water Boss Says
September 04, 2006
— By Michael Byrnes, Reuters
SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA — Rich countries should not keep less developed ones poor by fashionable trends that oppose dams and water management infrastructure, a top World Bank water resources chief said on Monday.
Australia, the driest inhabited country in the world, would not be the rich, developed country it is today if dams and water infrastructure had not been built, David Grey, senior water adviser at The World Bank, told Reuters in an interview.
Developed countries have been taking too broad a brush to dams and keeping poor countries poor in the process, he said.
"We're telling them (poor nations) not to do what we did in order to get rich ourselves," Grey said from Brisbane, where he had addressed the ninth annual International River Symposium conference.
Grey said that the pendulum was swinging back toward greater acceptance of dams and water infrastructure as part of the overall management of water, and the World Bank was committed to financing responsible water development.
