Kyoto accord signals death knell for dinosaur era fish in Canada

[420inTN]

Wed May 18, 1:10 PM ET

OTTAWA (AFP) - The world's oldest, largest and arguably ugliest freshwater fish, already on the brink of extinction in North America, is now facing a new and highly unexpected threat to its survival in Canada -- the international Kyoto accord on the environment.

The agreement, to which Canada is a signatory, recently sparked a massive planning effort in this country to build more than 100 new hydro-electric dams in central and western parts of the country to generate cleaner energy and replace aging fossil-fuel-burning plants to meet Canada's reduced greenhouse gas emissions target (six percent below 1990 levels) under Kyoto.

But, these structures will cut off the armour-plated lake sturgeon that once swam in nearly every river and lake in North America, survived predation by dinosaurs and was a staple for local aboriginals for centuries, from its breeding grounds as well as destroy its habitat, said environmentalists.

"It's a bizarre turn of events that this species is now connected to Kyoto," said University of Manitoba zoologist Terry Dick. He has been trying in earnest to reintroduce the lake sturgeon into local rivers.
"It's a big problem because hydro-electric dams are primarily built on good spawning sites or nursery areas where the fish feed. It's going to be an issue in (the provinces of) Manitoba and Ontario where they're now looking at rivers where before they weren't going to have hydro-electric dams," he said.

more, full story http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20050518/sc_afp/canadaenvironmentfishclimatekyoto">here

[phantom power]

1. Hydro might be the worst of the "green" energy sources.

It does so much damage to the rivers, and it isn't even completely renewable. Reservoirs inevitably silt in.

Hell, it doesn't even provide that much power, compared to what we actually use. I read somewhere that if we dammed up every mile of river in the US for hydro, it still wouldn't provide more than a few percent of our current power consumption.

[Canadian Socialist]

2. This is very very sad

I remember fishing out at Lake of the Woods and seeing this incredibly ugly but very large fish all the time. Mind you this was over 30 years ago.

[alfredo]

12. Here's two pictures of the fish

[THX1138]

13. That 3rd fish is pretty ugly

It looks like a monkey.

[alfredo]

15. Just another bottom feeder.

[roguevalley]

16. RIP fish. We were glad you managed to stay. We expect to join

you shortly ourselves.

[K-W]

3. Sounds like Canada's power choices relating to Kyoto, not Kyoto

are spelling a death knell. What an odd headline. I see the irony in it, but I think if the Fish had a vote, he would probably support Kyoto but not the dams in certain rivers.

[Hand]

4. True that...

Canada's just beginning to develop wind generation--and doing a pretty crummy job of it in Nova Scotia, at least so far. The power company here wants to charge premium prices for wind-generated power as a customer option!

They're already up shit creek, fortunately, for lousy emergency reponse due to downsizing as well as price gouging, so this idea went nowhere. Unfortunately, so it seems is wind generation.
:grr:

[daleo]

5. I recall seeing some wind turbines on Cape Breton Island a while back.

Beautiful place. So is the rest of the province.

[Hand]

9. Yes...

Those are the ones NSP wanted to charge a premium for. Nova Scotia's actually a very good candidate for wind power; the capital investment's the big thing. Unfortunately, NSP has a big investment in coal fired plants--originally to be fueled by Cape Breton coal, but coal mining's moribund in NS nw and unlikely ever to recover, so... imported coal. :dunce:

[420inTN]

17. I just got a flyer in the mail from my local power provider...

(MLGW - Memphis Light Gas and Water), saying that for an additional $4/month, i can buy 150kw/hr of "green" electricity.

[XemaSab]

14. This is a classic example

of making it sound like environmentalists have their heads up their asses.

I'm totally appalled at the fact that if you just read the headline, you would think it's actually the Kyoto protocol dooming the fish, and not one of Canada's possible responses to the Kyoto protocol.

Like acid rain, logging, and runoff from oil and gas drilling sites and strip mines have nothing to do with the decline in fisheries in north america.

[Gregorian]

6. Until the population is reduced, the damage will continue.

It's not the technique. It's not the engineering. It's not how efficient. It's the population. I've argued with engineers (with five kids) who say we can engineer our way around the population problem. Not! Because if it's reducing co2 emissions, or providing water, or sewage, or food, or whatever, it's the population. The time to do something about it was in 1950. Not now. Now it's too late. Now we HAVE to engineer our way into survival. That is a shitty way to do business. I've never said to not live in comfort. The issue isn't about pollution. It's about numbers. The even sadder part is that now that our number is so great, nature will do the job for us. In a brutal way. So we've killed the planet, and now we are going to suffer immensely. It will be war, or starvation, or disease. Humans are not that smart. They can go to the moon, but they can't see what's right under their noses.

[K-W]

7. ignore, self delete

ignore

[aneerkoinos]

10. Soft landing

You are right. It's the population plus the end of fossile energy era. All the effort and planning should be directed at the question, how to survive as species (that is allready in serious overshoot) and as civilization (with great potential for wisdom and understanding) beyond 2050, which is the predicted population peak, as humanely as possible.

Soft landing is materially and culturally possible, only question is it politically possible. And the saddest truth is, without US we would have much better chances.

[Robeson]

19. I agree....

...its the 10,000 pound gorilla in the room.

[xchrom]

8. sad.

hydro is one of of my least fav forms of producing power.
it's not really efficient, it wreaks havoc on the local environment, and there's little return for the money.

and to think this may end the time on earth for this fish.

[Lisa]

11. reservoirs also emit greenhouse gases

Decomposition of the organic matter in the submerged dead vegetation (and in the soil itself) can release methane -- a gas which, molecule for molecule, has a stronger global warming potential than CO2. So if the sites aren't chosen carefully, there can be problems with hydro power as well.

That said, there are some suggested developments, e.g. "microhydro", which don't require the same kind of habitat disruption, which are now being examined.

[daleo]

18. I recall a recent article about sturgeon in the North Saskatchewan R.

Which flows from the Rockies, through the prairie provinces, and into Lake Winnipeg and eventually Hudson's Bay. As I recall, the article said the fish are in trouble due to regular old water pollution and previous over-fishing (not that hydro-dams don't have negative effects, just that there are many other threats).

http://www.greatcanadianrivers.com/rivers/north_saskatchwan/species-home.html