In the early 1970s Canada, like many other countries, followed the lead of the United States and its National Environmental Policy Act, by putting in place a framework for assessing the environmental impact of large development projects. Since that time, dam projects have been subject to extensive environmental studies, intended to predict their impacts on the environment, and to identify means of mitigating these impacts.

Studies of environmental impacts imply a substantial role for environmental
science, and for scientists able to take a broad perspective on hydroelectric dams; able, in effect, to consider the river as more than a liquid used to spin turbines. Developing such a role was, at any rate, one of the original objectives of those who drafted American environmental impact legislation, from which Canada and other countries borrowed. The idea was to broaden the range of expertise brought to bear on such projects; in effect, to expand the rationality applied to them. Engineering expertise, always essential to dam projects, was now condemned for its narrow perspective, and its failure to consider the significance of water in the landscape. It would now be accompanied by environmental science, that, it was assumed, could provide a more holistic, a more "ecological" perspective.

This, at any rate, was one expectation of environmental science, and especially ecology, when a role for it began to be required in considering large developments, including hydroelectric projects. But have these expectations been fulfilled? How has environmental science contributed to decisions and controversies regarding hydroelectric projects?

Three cases, two from Quebec, and one from Manitoba, can cast some light on these questions.In 1971 Premier Robert Bourassa announced the first phase of the James Bay hydroelectric project. The next year, after a Federal-Provincial committee had recommended that the James Bay region become a giant "natural laboratory" for study of the impact of large-scale development, one of the largest environmental research project ever conducted in Canada began. Millions of dollars were spent by the James Bay Development Corporation or by the James Bay Energy Corporation, on studies of the physical, chemical and biological features of reservoirs, rivers, and James Bay itself, and on ecosystem models intended to link this information together, to predict future environmental conditions in the region.

These studies have since been described as often highly impressive, in scientific terms. However, even as this massive research effort took place, it had little effect on development in the region. It did not lead to changes in the design or operational regime for the facilities. Instead, when impacts were identified, the task became to find ways to mitigate them, or to compensate resource users affected by these impacts.

One example will illustrate this. In 1971 and again in 1975 studies concluded that in the channels of rivers diverted elsewhere, minimum flows should be maintained, so that aquatic biota would have a chance of survival. But this was not done, and diversion plans were not modified. Instead, environmental scientists recommended remedial works, such as weirs designed to maintain water levels in river channels, and the replanting of exposed river channels. In effect, environmental science supported the engineering science that was
at the core of the James Bay project, by identifying how environmental impacts could be mitigated, without actually modifying any aspects of the project itself. In effect, environmental science assisted in this re-engineering of the northern Quebec landscape.

A second example comes from northern Manitoba, and power projects initiated by Manitoba Hydro. Beginning in the late 1960s, the Churchill and Nelson Rivers -- the two largest rivers of northern Manitoba -- were re-arranged, with most of the flow of the Churchill being diverted into the Nelson, to maximize power production at several dams on the lower Nelson. In the early 1970s, studies of the impacts of this scheme took place. As
in Quebec, these studies took place only after the design and operating regime of the project had been finalized. And, again as in Quebec, these studies were therefore only of effective value as a guide to mitigating the results of re-engineering the northern Manitoba landscape.

However, during the 1970s further research on the impacts of this development was done, by scientists at a federal research institute, the Freshwater Institute, in Winnipeg. Unlike earlier studies, this research was not tied directly, in either financial or institutional terms, to Manitoba Hydro or the Manitoba government. Instead, a major motivating factor in this work was the ambition of the scientists involved to revise existing theoretical
perspectives on the impact of flooding and river diversion on aquatic ecosystems.Of particular significance in the theoretical perspectives developed as a result of this research was that they viewed these impacts in terms of the disruption of the flows of energy and matter within ecosystems, impairing the capacity of ecosystems to maintain themselves in a balanced, stable state, as they would be if they were not disrupted by human activity.

This was a view of nature existing in a state of balance and stability; when
humans interfere, their actions will tend to disrupt natural systems. These disruptions would be of such a scale that they could not possibly be mitigated. Overall, this was a very different view from that provided by environmental science that was supportive of the large-scale engineering necessary to turn rivers into economic commodities.

Finally, one can turn to a more recent example of environmental research on the impacts of hydroelectric projects. In the early 1990s the "Hudson Bay Program" assessed the cumulative impacts of all actual or potential dams on the rivers flowing into the Hudson and James Bays. It did so by drawing not only on conventional scientific studies, but on indigenous knowledge -- the environmental knowledge gained through long experience of hunting, fishing, trapping and living on the land.

Such knowledge is inseparable from inhabiting, and using the land. Its implications in terms of views of the landscape can therefore be contrasted with those views already noted: while the Hudson Bay Program, warning of the cumulative impacts of multiple hydropower projects on James Bay, provided a severe critique of the industrial transformation of this region, neither did it present a view of a balanced, stable, nature best left alone by humans. Instead, it affirmed the centrality of the landscape to those who live
there, who use the landscape, without transforming it.

Thus, environmental science has exhibited several different relationships to
hydroelectric technology. These also reflect different views of nature: as water to be conquered and manipulated, to serve human interests; as a system that will maintain itself in a steady state, if protected from disruption by humans; or as a landscape that should not be dominated by humans, but not either be protected from intrusion.

These views of nature also exemplify some aspects of the relation between science and its institutions. As the history of recent ecology and environmental science indicates, scientific views of the environment, like scientific ideas generally, are often shaped by the institutional contexts in which science takes place. The significance of such contexts are also indicated in these cases: in the close client/patron relationships between scientists and the James Bay Energy Corporation; in the professional autonomy of scientists at the Freshwater Institute; or in the ties between the Hudson Bay Program and communities of this region.

But beyond these contrasting views of nature, what has been the practical
significance of environmental science? Has it influenced how Canadians have actually used their rivers, beyond providing views of nature to justify its manipulation, protection, or use?

Consider, first, a few general patterns in the development of the science of
environmental impact assessment in Canada. On the one hand, it has often been argued that it has become considerably more sophisticated over the last two decades. In the early 1970s, many impact studies consisted of little more than descriptive surveys of the environment, with little effort to predict the actual impacts of development. Such studies amply justified the notorious critique of the ecologist David Schindler, who in 1976 described environmental impact assessment research in Canada as little more than a
"boondoggle," having little relation to actual decisions, and whose only apparent function was to provide employment for ecologists.

In part in reaction to such critiques, environmental impact studies have since
emphasized providing specific predictions, addressing specific concerns and issues, particularly regarding mitigation of specific impacts. This emphasis on specific relevance is most apparent in studies accompanying the James Bay project.

But another view of this is also possible. Consider one event in 1994: Cree people of the James Bay region paddled a canoe out of Quebec, to New York City. This was part of their effort to force reconsideration of the Great Whale project, an expansion of the James Bay development. They did this by taking their case to the heartland of those to whom Hydro Quebec hoped to sell its electricity. By doing so, they signalled their dissatisfaction with the "official" decision process for the Great Whale project, including studies of its environmental impacts, Every paddle stroke on this canoe journey was an implicit rejection of this process. In the 1970s environmental impact studies had helped provide a basis for the compensation agreement between the Quebec government and the Cree affected by the James Bay project. In the
1990s the Cree rejected the principle of compensation and mitigation of hydroelectric power projects, and this rejection encompassed the science associated with that process.

It could be argued that the era of large-scale hydroelectric power has ended. While there may well be a few projects to come, particularly in Labrador, recent events, such as the deferral of the Great Whale project in 1994, and of the Kemano hydroelectric expansion project in British Columbia in 1995, suggest that such projects will be in isolation, no longer part of a wave of development sweeping north across the Canadian landscape.Of course, this rejection of hydroelectric power has only occurred after most of the best sites have been taken. But it also reflects how attitudes have changed, concerning
reshaping landscapes, and the lives of those who live in these landscapes, to satisfy the power needs of the metropolis. And it reflects a changing view of rivers, in which they are seen not just as plumbing to be rearranged to suit human needs; but as having their own value in the Canadian landscape, to not be tampered with carelessly.

It may well be that these changes in attitudes and values reflect to some extent the influence of environmental science. But if the science has been influential in this way, it has been so by providing general lessons concerning the human impact on nature, and concerning how humans might co-exist with, without dominating, the landscape. This leads, then, to a paradox: even as environmental research on dam projects has sought to address more rigorously specific questions and problems encountered in the engineering of
rivers, opposition to dam projects, and eventually decisions concerning these projects, has drawn on more general political, economic, and cultural objections. These are objections regarding which which environmental research seeking immediate relevance are silent. Struggling to be relevant, environmental science has risked its own marginalization in contemporary Canadian debates concerning dams and rivers.