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Open Rivers Programme continues to support projects in France and across Europe

72 projects supported by the Open Rivers programme throughout Europe and a new call for projects underway

At the beginning of November 2023, the Open Rivers Programme* launched a new call for projects to provide financial support for the removal of weirs and dams. Applications can be sent in until 8 December.

After two years of the implementation of the Open Rivers Programme, 72 projects are supported throughout Europe, either underway or completed, contributing to the achievement of the objective of 25,000 km of freeflowing rivers by 2030 in Europe, voted on 09/11/2023 by the European Parliament as part of the Restoration Naturation Law. It is a significant support for restoring rivers in Europe, including in France where legislation to restore ecological continuity is frequently attacked to slow the momentum and hamper the efforts made by a community of stakeholders to restore our rivers effectively and sustainably in favour of energy issues of little interest.

France is one of the pioneers of the dam and weir removal movement in Europe, which began in 1998, and the results are encouraging, not only in terms of reconnecting river habitats but also in terms of increasing functionality and reducing the risk of flooding. Other European countries, such as Finland, Spain and Sweden, also see dam removal as a viable solution for restoring rivers. Elsewhere, however, tools are still lacking, particularly in Eastern Europe, to facilitate the implementation of such measures. This is why ERN, together with regional and international partners (World Fish Migration Foundation (WFMF), Fauna & Flora, MedINA Greece, Wetlands International (WI), WWF Netherlands, Slovakia, and Adria) are running a project with the Open Rivers Programme to facilitate and accelerate the removal of barriers in 4 target countries: Croatia, Greece, Romania and Slovakia. These countries have all the conditions needed to develop, inspire and raise awareness of the benefits of this tool for restoring nature: high ecological potential, emerging opportunities and projects, strong community involvement (more info).

In this context, WWF, WFMF and ERN are organising Q&A sessions to answer technical questions from potential projects on 15 and 20 November. Interested parties can contact corinne.ronot@rivernet.org  The next Open Rivers application session is scheduled for the end of February for all grant categories.

Latest news on French projects run by ERN and its local partners

Since 2021 and the launch of the programme, ERN has applied with several local partners for preliminary studies and works, and 6 projects have been selected.

In 2022-2023 ERN worked with the SYMBA on the Open Rivers Programme application to restore the Tardoire, an european eel river. After six months of works to removed four obsoletes weirs, the river was flowing again on more than 20 kms. After just a few months, the riverbed was unrecognisable, and habitats were quickly recreated (more info). To make this story happened Open Rivers Programme funded 100% of the works, because even the local stakeholders were all in favour of the project, the States at this moment was not in a position to finance such project. A 12 minutes movie in French and English subtitle relate the project and the stakeholders involvement.

Latest, ERN and its local partners obtained two new preliminary study projects for the removal of small obsolete weirs. One is located in the Eyrieux river basin (Ardèche catchement) and is run by the SMEC and the other is in the Branugues river basin (Cère and Dordogne catchement) and is run by the SMDMCA. These two projects are located in preserved area with high biodiversity potential and will allowed to reconnect habitats for fish (trout) and white-clawed crayfish, increase their range, and improve the resilience and morphology of the river. A great opportunity to restore the functionality of the river through a simple acte : remove obsolete barrieres on rivers.

More info

* Open Rivers Programme is a foundation funded by Arcadia which aims to restore endangered European rivers by supporting interventions that lead to the removal of small dams and the restoration of river flow and biodiversity.

 

Download press release 

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Hydroelectricity – EU: Open letter from Living Rivers Europe (LRE)

In February, around a hundred NGOs co-signed Living Rivers Europe’s letter to the European Commission calling on EU decision-makers to protect Europe’s rivers from the deployment of new hydropower plants. The Commission’s response, received on 4 May 2023, contains several erroneous statements about the role of hydropower in the deployment of renewable energies in Europe.

LRE responded to the Commission on 20 October with a new open letter co-signed by 100 NGOs.

Extract : “In Europe, a large majority of the planned hydropower capacity is small plants – 93% of planned projects have a capacity <10 MW and 60% below 1 MW. Therefore they are unable to significantly back up variable renewables. On the contrary, the smallest run-of-river hydropower plants are subject to seasonal river flows, thus they operate as an intermittent energy source. Many of those planned small plants are in protected areas. Building new storage and pumped storage power plants where two reservoirs do not already exist is likely to cause irreversible damage to rivers, due to landscape change and hydropeaking.

read the open letter

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Open Rivers : Fourth weir removed on the Tardoire

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The citizens’ march for water has just ended and the dialogue between the players is beginning

After 6 days of walking and 2 days of canoeing, the citizens’ walk for the fair sharing of water resources came to an end on Sunday 9 July after the Big Jump.

The forty or so walkers who took part between 1 and 9 July discovered all the facilities that make up the Montpezat hydroelectric complex in the Loire catchment area: the Veyradère water intake, the Issarlès lake, the Gage dam and the Lapalisse dam on the Loire. After climbing back up to the source of the Loire in magnificent surroundings and visiting the Atlantic/Mediterranean watershed, they followed the route of the gallery that leads to the equilibrium chimney, then to the underground hydroelectric power station at Monptezat. Finally, they were able to discover the Pont de Veyrières demodulator dam, which was exceptionally flooded that day. The walk ended at the confluence of the Fontaulière and Ardèche rivers. Admiring the technical prowess, the folly of man and questioning the sharing of water between man and the environment summed up the impression left by these structures on the walkers.

Along the way, meetings and 2 evening debates with EDF, as well as the main players impacted by the management of this structure (Issarlès lake town hall, members of the Loire Amont and Ardèche SAGEs, Water Agency, 43 Fishing Federation, FRAPNA Ardèche, local residents) provided an opportunity to continue but also to initiate interactive discussions and to identify the problems and visions of the two basins (increasing scarcity of resources, Lake Issarlès as the lung of Montpezat and angry local residents, committed water saving, impact of tourism on drinking water and the environment, etc.). These moments of exchange, welcomed by all the stakeholders, are the beginning of a story that will soon be written as part of the renewal of the complex’s concession. Getting to know each other and the state of the resource, discussing needs and problems is a prerequisite for finding a new compromise and solutions that meet the needs of people, environments and uses.

2 days of canoeing on the Ardèche and a Big Jump rounded off this week of learning and discovery.

More information about walking

More information on the Montpezat complex

The recordings of the two evening debates will be available shortly.

Marche citoyenne pour l'eau - 2023

Prise d’eau de la Veyradère © ERN

Marche citoyenne pour l'eau - 2023

Débat Le Lac d’Issarlès

Marche citoyenne pour l'eau - 2023

La Loire près de sources © ERN

Marche citoyenne pour l'eau - 2023

Mont Gerbier de Jonc © ERN

marche citoyenne pour l'eau 2023 - Burzet, prox cheminée d'équilibre

© ERN

Marche citoyenne pour l'eau - 2023, barrage démodulateur

© ERN

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Open Rivers : Third weir removed on the Tardoire!

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OPEN RIVERS PROGRAMME : 7 July next call for applications

The Open Rivers Program announces the next call for applications for 7 July 2023 (5th sessions since the programme began, deadline for application : 1st September).

For this call, organisations from all over Europe are encouraged to apply for all grant categories.

A new feature of this call for proposals is that public-sector support structures will also be eligible as leading, but only for demolition grants if match funding is available. Before applying in this context, a discussion with Open Rivers will be necessary. See the updated Open Rivers guide, in which all the new eligibility criteria will be detailed.

As an NGO, and with 4 projects underway with Open Rivers, ERN is in regular contact with the programme and closely follows its developments. ERN is therefore still a strong partner which, together with a field coordinator such as a river syndicate, can propose a project in France.

In other European country, ERN provides a help desk to support a project idea and links organisation with other applicants or referents.

Q&A sessions for France and European countries will be organised in the near futur.

Memo : an run application process is approximatively 9 months. For an application to session 5, from 7 July 2023, your project will not be able to start until March 2024 if it is selected. Project duration: 1 year.

 

More info

Save the “Nature Restauration Law”

The Nature Restoration Law, which will be shortly put to vote in the European Parliament, sets the target of restoring at least 25,000 km of free-flowing watercourses by 2030 (Article 7) in order to improve the natural longitudinal and lateral connectivity of watercourses. These objectives complement the obligations of the Water Framework Directive and is necessary given the significant degradation of aquatic ecosystems.

Read our note for Members of the European Parliament  in french  and english.

We should even go further and set a target of 178,000 km by 2030.

But even more, there is a high risk that it will be fully rejected as several parties went as far as calling to completely denied it back this past May.  This next Thursday 15 June the ENVI Committee of the European Parliament must be strong.

Send a message easy and quick message to your decision-maker to be ambitious : https://www.restorenature.eu/en/take-action #RestoreNature

 

The Nature Restoration Law proposal lays out plans to restore thousands of kilometers of rivers.

More info about fragmentation by dams

More info about Nature Restauration Law (anglais)

DRE launch today the dam removal progress report for 2022

The latest report uncovers a surprising figure of (at least) 325 barriers have been removed in 16 European countries – a new record! As in 2021, most of the removed barriers were weirs, as these structures have a high probability of being old and obsolete and can be removed in a cost-efficient way. But large dams such as the Roche-qui-boit dam in France (16m high) are also among the 2022 achievements.

Several factors have contributed to the new numbers such as newly available funding opportunities, like the Open Rivers Programme, the coordinated efforts of national and regional public authorities to report removed barriers, and the hype created by findings of last year’s report disseminated all around Europe.

Given the latest developments in European climate policy and the Commission’s proposal for a Nature Restoration Law, it is important to keep highlighting dam removal as a crucial tool to accomplish ecosystem restoration and celebrating success stories across Europe. Moreover, barrier removal also contributes to the global Freshwater Challenge to restore 300,000km of degraded rivers by 2030, a goal launched at the UN Water Conference held in New York in March. Besides pollution, habitat degradation, and over exploitation of natural resources, freshwater ecosystems face one major issue: dams.

It has been found that over 1,2 million barriers fragment European rivers, with many being obsolete. Among the several harmful consequences is biodiversity loss, with a decline of 93% in freshwater migratory fish populations in Europe and 76% on a global level. The alarming numbers ask for costeffective and efficient solutions to restore rivers. Dam removal has been paving its way in nature
restoration tools – a trend has been confirmed across Dam Removal Europe’s annual reports.

Read the press release

Read the report

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Open Rivers : Second weir removed on the Tardoire !

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France : “Nouveau Poutès dam” : observation of the lenght of the reservoir

> Watch the ERN Video “Overflight of the Allier River upstream of the Poutès dam” 

Only since the second week of March it has been possible to turbine. Indeed, since the closing of the gates, the Allier had never exceeded the reserved flow (5m3/sec). According to EDF, the operating tests were positive.

On March 15, with a total flow of 15m3/sec, we were able to observe the creation of a reservoir over a few hundred meters. Further upstream, the Allier, deeper than in the ‘transparency’ mode of the dam over a few hundred meters, remained in its former minor bed with a good current favorable to migration.

On Thursday March 24th, this time with a total flow of the Allier of 10M3/sec, SOS Loire Vivante – ERN  flew over the site at high altitude with a drone to better observe the evolution of the bed and the water retention area. In addition, with the authorization of EDF, we flew at low altitude as close as possible to the dam and the water intake. The observations of March 15 were confirmed.

> Watch the ERN Video “Overflight of the Allier River upstream of the Poutès dam”