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Hydropower dams can help mitigate the global warming impact of wetlands

Manage methane emissions and produce clean, cheap energy at the same time, argues Mike Muller.
  1. Mike Muller

    1. Mike Muller is a visiting adjunct professor at the University of Witwatersrand School of Governance in Johannesburg, South Africa. He is a member of the Climate Bonds Initiative’s Hydropower Technical Working Group and adviser to Mozambique’s Hidroelectrica Cahora Bassa company. He previously held senior positions in South African water and planning agencies and was responsible for water management in Mozambique’s Sofala province in the early 1980s.

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High angle view of a huge water stream spurting from the Katse Hydroelectric Dam in Lesotho

The Katse dam on the Malibamat’so River in Lesotho was completed in 2009. Credit: Fabian Plock/EyeEm/Getty

Every few years, a cyclone hits Mozambique’s Sofala province. The Pungwe River floods and severs road connections between Zimbabwe and coastal ports, sometimes for months. After a few weeks, the standing water starts to bubble as flooded vegetation decays. This ‘marsh gas’ is methane, a greenhouse gas that is some 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide.

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Nature 566, 315-317 (2019)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-019-00616-w

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