There has been much written about the negative social and environmental impacts of large hydropower dams, particularly the impacts on people and the environment caused by flooding linked to the creation of large reservoirs. There has also long been recognition of the importance of Indigenous and local knowledge for understanding ecological processes and environmental impacts. In this paper, however, we focus on a topic that has received insufficient consideration: the downstream impacts of dams, and the role of Indigenous and local knowledge in assessing and addressing these impacts. Using examples from three river basins in different parts of the world: the Peace–Athabasca in Canada, the Mekong in mainland Southeast Asia, and the Amazon in Brazil, we demonstrate that the downstream impacts of hydropower dams are often neglected due to the frequently long distances between dams and impacted areas, jurisdictional boundaries, and the less obvious nature of downstream impacts. We contend that Indigenous or local knowledge, if applied consistently and appropriately, has important roles to play in understanding and addressing these impacts, with the goal of avoiding, reducing, and appropriately compensating for the types of environmental injustices that are frequently associated with the downstream impacts of dams.

中文翻译：

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水电大坝的下游影响以及土著和当地知识：来自和平的例子——阿萨巴斯卡、湄公河和亚马逊

关于大型水电站大坝对社会和环境的负面影响，特别是与大型水库建设相关的洪水对人类和环境的影响，已有很多文章。人们早就认识到土著和地方知识对于理解生态过程和环境影响的重要性。然而，在本文中，我们关注的主题并未得到充分考虑：大坝的下游影响，以及土著和当地知识在评估和解决这些影响中的作用。使用来自世界不同地区的三个河流流域的例子：加拿大的和平-阿萨巴斯卡河、东南亚大陆的湄公河和巴西的亚马逊河，我们证明了水电站大坝对下游的影响往往被忽视，因为大坝与受影响地区之间的距离经常很长，管辖边界以及下游影响的性质不太明显。我们认为，土著或当地知识如果得到一致和适当的应用，在理解和解决这些影响方面可以发挥重要作用，目标是避免、减少和适当补偿经常与下游相关的环境不公正类型大坝的影响。