Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
photograph the amount of snow and water in the landscape, estimating from their
observations the amount of water that will descend the river during spring, as well
as gauging approximately when this will happen, or over which period of time. A
moderate amount of snow, melting quickly during a sudden heat spell, can cause a
much larger flood than a huge amount of snow that melts slowly because of low
temperatures.
A further fact that precludes a genuine 'management' of the Kemi River is that
the hydroelectricity producers' lives are interwoven with the river in many ways
that have little to do with hydropower. They all live close to it and spend a consid-
erable part of their leisure time at, on and in the river. Some even grew up along
the river. The hydroelectricity company owns a number of cabins on the Kemi
River and its tributaries, which employees can, and often do, utilize. Hydroelec-
tricity producers thus know and experience the river not merely as a power re-
source, but also by fishing, skiing, swimming and living with it. Many of the engi-
neers' ideas about the river do not come from topics or hydroelectricity
production, but from their childhood and leisure time experiences. To an extent,
the river has become part of the engineers' personalities. Therefore, it is unlikely
that the Kemi River figures in their work merely as an object of management.
Focussing on the practices of hydroelectricity production, instead of solely on
the immensity of the dams and data employed, a rather different image emerges
than that of a subjugation of the river. The people working in the power company
have to know the river exceptionally well and they must constantly negotiate the
energy demands of the electricity market with the actual state of the river. This re-
lation is not adequately described with the concept of 'control'. Even 'manage-
ment' - if understood as the manipulation of an environmental phenomenon ac-
cording to a predefined plan - captures the reality of hydroelectric production only
partially. In fact, hydroelectricity producers do not manage the river any more than
the river manages them.
19.8 Conclusion: The Limits of River 'Management'
What is thus to be made of river management? Is it possible at all? Or does the
very logic of a river - its flow, its seasonal variation and its unpredictability - pre-
clude the idea of management, if not understood as a reciprocal relation of en-
gagement? Is it useful to further the ideal of river management by increasing the
amount of structures and data to tighten the grip on an ephemeral flow? Or would
a fundamentally different approach do the river more justice - and thereby also
work better?
Arguably, the actual practice of hydroelectricity production - as opposed to the
ideal to which it is often stylised by both proponents and adversaries - can serve
as a point of departure for thinking about such an alternative. With its pronounced
elements of negotiating with the dynamics of the river, this practice is - at closer
inspection - much more similar to that of constructing and maintaining the other
type of cross-river construction, the salmon weir: These weirs were not built to
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