Prolly true except for those projects endorsed by TPTB. Existing projects currently owned by utilities will likely continue, but it will be the independent generator's continuing challenge to keep the hydroproject viable.
FEMA and the USArmy Corps of Engineers have a policy of "letting the rivers run wild." The Edwards Dam in Maine is one of the larger projects the Corps has given back to nature. Here in Cow Hampshire, at last examination, the NH State Department of Public Safety had upwards of five dam demolition project in mind. See
http://des.nh.gov/organization/divisions/water/dam/damremoval/index.htm The only thing that keeps these dams in place is gravity and the lack of funding to do the demo/remediation.
However, one can hope on small hydro. If you own a small river and substantial land - and you can keep "under the radar" - it's possible to set something up for one's own use.
I once read an article in
Fine Woodworking Magazine about a wood turner out in the western half of Massachusetts who was looking for advice on how better to use his 75 watt (!) output from his hydro site. He was using it to power his lathe, but wanted to know options for use in lighting, cooking, and other sundry uses (a subsistance worker, he apparently was used to "living on the edge.")
The recommendation was to somehow "store" the 1.8kwhr a day (about 30 cents worth) in a battery.
I guess you could say here was a man who has learned to "live on less." The question is, do you call this "living?"
But he was free of a utility bill. What price do you put on freedom?
Talking about under the radar. I was climbing on Mount Major here in New Hampshire (south of Lake Winnipesaukee) and nearby the parking lot is a small river which parallels the trailhead for the mountain. Before our climb, I noticed a 2" plastic pipe in the riverbed. Following the pipe upstream a short distance, I found it terminated in a very nicely constructed plastic box with screening on three sides. Someone had been keeping the leaves and pine needles from getting sucked up by the 2" pipe.
Following it downstream, it passed with the river through a culvert underneath the road, and then with the stream went under a fence and into the back of a cottage/housing development along Lake Winnepesaukee. This all was a sizable installation: maybe 75 or 100 foot fall and 400 feet of 2" plastic pipe. Someone put some serious time and money installing this - probably in the dark to avoid detection.
You're likely thinking like I was thinking - someone is doing some "pirate self-generation" using NH state owned land and water resource.
Most of the sheeple looking at that installation wouldn't have known what they were looking at.
Joe
