In a big win for river restoration, the House passed the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021 late last Friday, November 5 (the Senate passed a nearly identical bill in August and this legislation will now be sent to the President’s desk asap). The bill includes an unprecedented $2.3 billion (yes, billion!) for environmental and recreation enhancements around and below dams (read: restoration of streams and recreation access upgrades), dam removal, and dam safety improvements. As part of a broad coalition of stakeholders in the future of hydropower dams, and in our capacity as leaders in the Hydropower Reform Coalition, we were able to reach out directly to congressional members and their staff requesting funding for these dam related priorities. We ended up playing a significant role in directing, what is in our estimation, the most money ever federally appropriated for the removal of, and environmental restoration of, dam affected rivers in the history of the United States.
We anticipate hundreds of thousands of jobs as a result of this legislation and look at it as a solid investment in desperately needed climate change action. Removing dams and restoring healthy, free-flowing rivers enhances their climate resilience, while also protecting downstream communities from dangerous and outdated crumbling dam infrastructure. Funding for dam removal is a constant challenge and this legislation provides grants and the authorization for the removal of some of our most damaging and obsolete hydropower projects. Tens of thousands of dams have wreaked havoc on river health across the country for over a century, threatening fish and wildlife populations, diminishing recreation opportunities and drowning historic and cultural resources. As the frequency and size of floods increase with climate change, dam structures become more and more of a public safety hazard. Dams are infrastructure and we’re proud of the strong role we played in securing dam removal and restoration as a significant part of this federal infrastructure legislation.
We’ve also made new investments in our capacity to engage in DC and alongside our partnership with Outdoor Alliance, it’s given our community an outsized voice in negotiations over hydropower, and other dam and river related policy action. Despite this success, we’re still pushing for more, including important river and climate policies, some of which are still contained in the current trimmed down version of the Build Back Better Act, legislation which now has a framework moving through Congress and may pass soon. Elements of that legislation that we’ve played a role in shaping and advocating for are a Civilian Climate Corps, mining removals, cleanups and increased royalties for restoration, funding for improved NEPA and other environmental review processes, programs to increase equitable access to the outdoors, and funding for ecosystem resilience, wildfire response and fuel reduction, trail and road access improvements, and other maintenance on public lands.