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PRESS RELEASE
UNDAMMED: Freeing River and Bringing Communities to Life
by Tara Lohan
Washington, DC (October 14, 2025) — Free-flowing rivers in the United States are all but gone. Over half a million dams have obstructed rivers and streams, with sometimes devastating impacts. But in an uplifting environmental story, efforts are successfully undamming rivers and demolishing these harmful, and often obsolete, structures and bringing new life to stifled waterways.
In Undammed: Freeing Rivers and Bringing Communities to Life (Publication Date: October 14, 2025), environmental journalist Tara Lohan charts the rise of the dam removal movement and shares the remarkable benefits of undamming waterways for plants, animals, and people. With compelling, engaging storytelling, Lohan illustrates that restoring rivers improves water quality, boosts climate resilience, increases dwindling fish populations, aids the local economy, supports native flora and fauna, and so much more.
Traveling the US, Lohan brings readers to dam removal projects both small and large. In the Pacific Northwest, she delves into politically heated debates over dam removal on the Lower Snake River to help restore salmon and orca populations. Over in Virginia, she shares the exhilarating moment when a small, defunct dam comes down and a river at last runs free. And in Maine, where the dam-removal movement got its start, she finds out if decades of dam removals can help save critically endangered Atlantic salmon. In the Southwest, she shows how people are rethinking the need for monolithic concrete dams in the face of longer droughts, higher temperatures, and overallocated resources.
Throughout the book, Lohan also chronicles the successful effort to take down four dams on the Klamath River in California and Oregon, the largest dam-removal and river-restoration project in the world. Such removal efforts are having outsized positive impacts for a wide range of endangered and threatened species, from mighty salmon to tiny mussels, and the ecosystems that rely on them.
Lohan also shares the powerful stories of Native American tribes who have led the charge on dam removals with hard-fought victories revitalizing ancestral lands, sacred salmon, and traditional ways of life. That includes the successful effort to take down four dams on the Klamath River in California and Oregon, the largest dam-removal and river-restoration project in the world.
Inspirational and uplifting, Undammed is a testament to nature’s resilience and our power to create positive, long-lasting change. Undoing centuries of environmental harm is possible—is happening—and it starts one dam, one river, at a time.
Tara Lohan is an environmental journalist who has been writing about the confluence of water, energy, and biodiversity for nearly two decades. Her work has appeared in The Nation, The American Prospect, Grist, Salon, High Country News, and The Revelator. She’s the editor of two books on the global water crisis, Water Matters and Water Consciousness. She holds a master’s degree in literary nonfiction and lives in Bend, Oregon.
Undammed: Freeing Rivers and Bringing Communities to Life
Island Press Hardcover | Publication Date: October 14, 2025
288 pages | 6×9 | Price: $32.00
ISBN: 978-1-64283-334-8
Book Page: https://islandpress.org/books/undammed
Founded in 1984, Island Press works to stimulate, shape, and communicate the information that is essential for solving environmental problems. Today, with more than 1,000 titles in print and some 30 new releases each year, it is the nation’s leading publisher of books on environmental issues. Island Press is driving change by moving ideas from the printed page to public discourse and practice. Island Press’s emphasis is, and will continue to be, on transforming objective information into understanding and action. For more information and further updates be sure to visit www.islandpress.org.
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QUESTION AND ANSWER
Undammed
By Tara Lohan
Q: As an environmental journalist covering water and energy for over two decades, why did you decide to write Undammed?
A: I found myself suffering from crisis fatigue after years of writing about water pollution, biodiversity loss, and other environmental harms. During that time, I had been periodically writing about dam removals and I came to realize that not only did I enjoy writing them, but people really liked reading them, too. I realized I wasn’t the only one who was craving stories about finding solutions and undoing harm.
When I first began writing the book, the removal of four dams on the Klamath River was just about to begin. Standing at the cusp of the largest dam removal and river restoration project yet in history, I wanted to know how we got to this place. And not just why big dam removals like the Klamath were possible, but how dam removals had gone from a radical event to an established practice. In the last twenty-five years about 1,800 dams have come down. What have we learned? How has that changed our rivers and our communities? And what comes next?
Q: What are the benefits of dam removal? Why is there a renewed movement to remove dams?
A: Dam removals can help undo a long list of harms. Ecologically, dams have been a major contributor to the decimation of migratory fish populations, like salmon, steelhead, and river herring by blocking their access vital upstream habitat. The barriers also obstruct the downstream movement of sediment and nutrients, which depletes riverbanks and coastal beaches, hastening erosion. The water that backs up behind a dam — its impoundment — turns a river into an unnatural lake that can warm to temperatures lethal for some fish, incubate disease, or spur the spread of invasive species that prey on native residents. Removing dams returns natural flows, temperatures, and river function, which can improve water quality and help revitalize migratory fish populations that provide economic benefits, as well as cultural resources and food security for tribes.
There are also other economic and safety reasons. Many dams are “deadbeat” dams that no longer serve useful purposes and cost money to maintain — or worse, have been left in disrepair and create public safety problems. Dams don’t have to fail to be dangerous, either. Around 1,400 people have died at low-head dams because of their unseen and unsafe hydraulics.
I think the movement to remove dams is continuing to gather momentum because there’s a real need for it: Our fleet of dams is aging, and many are outdated or unsafe. Climate amplified storms are now testing dams in ways we haven’t seen before, and many are failing. But the biggest reason is that dam removals work. We’ve had several decades to see dam removals in action and it’s clear that they help restore rivers better and faster than other methods. And healthy rivers lead to healthy communities of all kinds.
Q: What are the criticisms of dam removal? Are there dams that should not be removed?
A: Many dams serve useful functions and provide important benefits for communities. I’ve yet to meet a dam removal advocate who thinks they should all come down — I certainly don’t. Opposition to dam removals can vary based on the project and the role the dams plays in the community. In some instances, resistance to dam removal can be simply rooted in resistance to change. If residents see dams as linked to the history of their town, like with many old mills dams — even if the dam no longer serves a function and the mill is long gone, people have grown accustomed to its presence.
Q: In the book, you cover many successful examples of dam removal across the US. What are your favorite stories of revitalization post-dam deconstruction?
A: There are so many wonderful dam removal stories, but I really love how removing dams played a key role in bringing the once lifeless Cuyahoga River, which infamously caught fire in 1969, back to life. Decades of work to reduce pollution helped considerably, but areas of the river still couldn’t meet water quality goals until they began removing dams. There have been five major projects so far, with one underway. The efforts have enabled the resurgence of wildlife. Minks, otters, bald eagles, herons, and peregrine falcons come to feast on invertebrates and dozens of species of fish. The revitalized waterway is also now supporting a vibrant river recreation economy.
It’s also been fun to watch the cascade of dam removals that have taken place in Maine since the Edwards Dam removal on the Kennebec River in Augusta in 1999. Dam removals in Maine have helped return millions of river herring in spring runs that are a boon for fishers, birds, and everyone who loves abundant wildlife.
Q: The success of the undamming of the Klamath River has gotten a lot of attention. Are there other success stories that deserve more attention?
A: The Klamath project is the largest effort of its kind and deserves all its accolades. Tribes and other allies spent decades working for this moment by building public support, waging legal battles, sharing scientific findings, and urging us all to expand our idea of what is possible in river restoration.
Their work was also informed by dam removal projects that came before them, notably the removal of two dams on the Elwha River in Washington completed in 2014. It was the biggest project of its kind at the time and years of scientific study on the Elwha have helped advance our understanding of how large amounts of sediment can be safely moved downstream during dam removals, and how reservoir footprints can be restored to healthy riparian ecosystems. The Klamath built upon that important work.
There is one thing that I think doesn’t get enough attention, though, and that’s small dam removals. Removing river barriers that are just a few feet tall can benefit wildlife, public safety, and help improve watershed health.
Q: As the US grapples with shifting federal priorities towards the environment, what do you think the future of dam removal will look like?
A: I hope that the movement continues to cruise along, but I think we’ll see some speedbumps.
Dam removal projects take years, sometimes decades, to come to fruition. In that time, presidential administrations come and go. But federal priorities can still have an impact. The dam removal movement got a big boost during the Biden administration from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which directed $800 million to dam removal projects. While that funding has been a boon, it’s also not the only way to remove dams. Many efforts to remove privately owned or municipally owned dams are funded by state and local agencies, nonprofits, and foundations.
When it comes to federally owned dams, though, we’re already seeing a change in direction and on the Snake River in the Pacific Northwest, a major setback. In June, President Trump withdrew from a historic agreement signed in 2023 by the federal government, Oregon, Washington, the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation, the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, the Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs Reservation, and the Nez Perce Tribe. The agreement had paused decades of litigation and created a roadmap for restoring imperiled salmon and steelhead populations by studying the breaching of four dams on the Lower Snake River and the replacement of the services they provide. With that agreement out the window, we’re back to a quagmire of litigation at a time when more than a dozen fish populations are teetering on the edge of extinction and the U.S. is failing to live up to its treaty obligations to the region’s tribes.
Q: As you note in the book, Undammed provides a solutions-focused, positive environmental news story. Why is the book’s message of hope more important than ever?
A: At the most basic level, I think we all need a good news story right now. But the value I see in these stories goes deeper. Dam removals require environmental and social change, and to do that we need collaboration. While there may be instances of disagreement over dam removals, more often they are a way to bring people together. In a time of great division, I think they can be unifying. They also offer proof that environmental restoration works. In a time of biodiversity loss, they’re helping restore abundance. In a time of climate peril, they put us on a path to greater resilience.
