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Title: Optimizing Amazonian dams for nature
Large river systems, particularly those shared by developing nations in the tropics, exemplify the interconnected and thorny challenges of achieving sustainability with respect to food, energy, and water ( 1 ). Numerous countries in South America, Africa, and Asia have committed to hydropower as a means to supply affordable energy with net-zero emissions by 2050 ( 2 ). The placement, size, and number of dams within each river basin network have enormous consequences for not only the ability to produce electricity ( 3 ) but also how they affect people whose livelihoods depend on the local river systems ( 4 ). On page 753 of this issue, Flecker et al. ( 5 ) present a way to assess a rich set of environmental parameters for an optimization analysis to efficiently sort through an enormous number of possible combinations for dam placements and help find the combination(s) that can achieve energy production targets while minimizing environmental costs in the Amazon basin.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1740042
PAR ID:
10344506
Author(s) / Creator(s):
;
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Science
Volume:
375
Issue:
6582
ISSN:
0036-8075
Page Range / eLocation ID:
714 to 715
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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