In 2023, eighty dams in the United States were destroyed. The leading group behind the destruction is the American Rivers Foundation (ARF), an eco-fascist outlet that considers human development through infrastructure improvement as a blight upon the Earth. In 2023, the Klamath Dams—four coordinated dams, ranging in height from 33 feet to 172—were removed. The tallest of the dams was majestic in appearance. The dams on the Klamath River, bordering the Klamath River basin and straddling either side of the Oregon-California border, had been constructed between 1903 and 1962 in order to power farms, mines, mills, and towns. They provided enough power for at least 55,000 households, and also provided flood control. (Some different background appeared in the Aug. 14 briefing).
ARF maintains a database, which reports that in 2023, aside from the Klamath Dams, 15 dams were removed in Pennsylvania, 9 dams in Oregon, 6 in Massachusetts, and dams removed in 22 other states. While the alleged issue for removing the Klamath Dams was that they restricted the salmon population, ARF disclosed its genocidal thinking in its literature: “There are more than 90,000 inventoried dams (and up to 400,000 dams total!) in our country. Up to 85% of them are unnecessary, harmful, and even dangerous. We must remove thousands of them quickly.” In 2022, the U.S. Congress passed the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which provided $800 million to remove dams. ARF ran a triumphalist article on Feb. 13, 2024, headlined: “Say Adios to 80 Dams in 2023.”
