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Too Precious to Dam
The Mokihinui remains under threat of being lost forever.
Meridian Energy plans to build an 85m high dam and drown the main gorge under a flat water lake 16 km long. The Mokihinui is the West Coast’s third largest river.
The gorge is a wilderness treasure, with beech forests, ancient podocarps, riotous displays of rata, and rimu festooned with kiekie. The river itself alternately dashes across granite and greywacke boulders, and glides through deep pools, as it twists and turns through the gorge.
This has been a mighty battle across conservation groups, fishers, and kayakers and rafters to speak out for this wild river and to engage in costly court hearings. It’s not over yet. There is a chance that if we continue to speak out long and loud, and raise awareness through events that attract the attention of the media and politicians, that the river will be saved.
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A question we must ask is whether efforts to save rivers such as the Mokihinui strike any resonance for average everyday New Zealanders?
Are these efforts seen as just a lot of noise from a bunch of greenies?
Unless "average" citizens see that it is important that our wild places remain, then we may lose them forever.
Dams may be "renewable" energy, but that alone does not make them right.
But what are the alternatives?
In the case of the Mokihinui there do in fact appear to be alternatives, such as the Stockton Proposal, but as a nation?
You can follow the progress of this campaign at either of these two links.
www.rivers.org.nz
or
www.forestandbird.org.nz
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