PUBLIC NEWS SERVICE • April 5, 2023
Hydropower developer Natel's mission is to outfit dams with blades that give fish a fighting chance. The company's Restoration Hydro Turbine system is designed to allow fish safe passage through the turbine itself. It does so through blades with leading edges meticulously blunted, curved, and slanted to minimize danger without compromising efficiency. In 2021, an evaluation of Natel's installation at Freedom Falls Mill in Maine demonstrated greater than 99 percent safe passage of 484 juvenile alewife, a species of migratory herring native to Maine rivers. The Freedom Falls Mill was first built in 1834, proving that even the oldest hydropower projects can be retrofitted to meet 21st-century standards of sustainability.