Damning the dam.

In a dramatic reversal from its business as usual, the federal government has ordered that a working hydroelectric dam be reduced to rubble in order to restore a river.

On November 25, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) - which licenses 1,600 of the nation's commercial electricity-producing dams - ordered the removal of the Edwards Dam on the Kennebec River in Augusta, Maine. Officials say removing the 160-year-old dam is the best and cheapest way to allow nine species of migratory fish, including Atlantic salmon, endangered sturgeon and striped bass, to reach 17 miles of prime spawning habitat above the dam.

Two years ago, a draft environmental study concluded that the dam could stay if its owner, Edwards Manufacturing Company, added expensive fish ladders. But FERC reversed its position after new studies concluded that installing fishways would do little to help four species of fish and would cost about $10 million - almost double the cost of removing the dam. The studies also found that removing the dam would have little effect on the state's electricity supply: it generates just 3.5 megawatts of electricity, less than one-tenth of one percent of Maine's annual energy usage.

Environmentalists and government officials are hailing FERC's reconsideration. "What is so incredible about the announcement is that it came from an agency that has never said no to a dam operator," says Pete Didisheim of the Natural Resources Council of Maine. Since 1920, FERC has ordered the removal of just seven of the 1,600 dams under its control (all for safety reasons after the owners had abandoned them).

"I've been working more than a decade for this - it's a satisfying moment" says Steve Brooke of the anti-dam Kennebec Coalition, which represents the conservation groups American Rivers, the Atlantic Salmon Federation, the Natural Resources Council of Maine and Trout Unlimited.

But Mark Isaacson of Edwards Manufacturing, which reportedly earns $2 million a year selling the dams electricity to a Maine utility, says the decision is "the flawed result of a tainted process" The company has asked for a reheating of the case, challenging FERC's authority and citing constitutional protections against uncompensated seizure of private property, Environmental groups welcome Edwards' appeal. "We're hoping that it will become a test case," says Kate Costenbader of American Rivers, "because we believe it will lay the groundwork for removing other dams that cannot be made environment-friendly."

And Alex Hoar, a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Hadley, Massachusetts, believes the case could mark the end of "a prevailing paradigm that says dams are a permanent feature of the landscape." He adds that it "opens up the exciting possibility of undoing some of the environmental impacts of the industrial revolution." CONTACT: American Rivers, 1025 Vermont Avenue NW, Suite 720, Washington, DC 20005/[phone]; Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, Office of Hydropower Licensing, 888 First Street NE, Washington DC 20426/[phone].