We live in Oulu and Oulu is noteworthy in part because of the hydroelectric power plant that has changed the face of the City’s river (called Oulujoki, literally Ouluriver). My partner and me, we talked about the dam a little while walking along the basin on top of the dam and it made me think that a monument like this is interesting because of its multi-facetedness:
On the one hand, this hydroelectric power plant can - if the conditions are right - provide the city with about a third of the electricity needed in a year. It is therefore a marvel of engineering, and it doesn’t need to burn anything to produce this energy. It can therefore be considered green energy. On the other hand, the power plant changed the face and course of the river forever and has had a not insignificant impact on the nature of the river.
From an ecologist’s perspective, hydroelectric power in general is somewhat questionable because of the large impact it has on ecosystems. The straightening of a river and the creation of a dam are the opposite of protecting valuable, one-of-a-kind river ecosystems. Oulu, for example, had great rapids before the hydropower plant was established that are now gone and gone for good. Its name, “Merikosken voimalaitos” which translates to “sea-rapids power plant”, still points to this legacy. We are not preserving the planet just for us, so if a power plant like this produces “green” electricity, what does that even mean? So we can continue business as usual? That seems counterproductive and naive to think about it so narrow-mindedly. From a historical perspective, a dam like the one regulating the river here in Oulu is a monument to historical development in general. I would like to believe that a plan to build a similar power plant would be considered differently, that we would employ a lighter touch to protect more of the original nature - if we would built it at all. But Oulu’s power plant was built in 1940. And it seems appropriate to recognize that a decision like building this dam was made then within the historical context of 1940 and not today. We need to recognize that our views now are a response to developments of the past, which in turn were a response to past responses themselves.
That doesn’t mean we need to be apologetic about any and all past decisions, but at least from a distance, we can see that everything has historicity inscribed, which makes it possible to appreciate monuments like a dam with a historian’s eye. Our current understanding is the result of collective missteps, conservative take-backs, and risky bets. It’s the sum total of the mixed bags of everything humans have ever created.
We infer what is new, correct and just (for now) from looking at the past in one way or another. A dam with its volatile meanings can be a bittersweet reminder and example of our situatedness in historical time and our transitoriness. We won’t have the last word.
But because of the possibility of watching a dam like this, we can realize the beauty of us being transients in time by recognizing its aesthetic merit. We can recognize that the dam and the park area around the dam - with all their marks of alien-seeming decision-making - can look beautiful and interesting because of this historicity.
Appreciation for industrial monuments like this is possible without bracketing their ecological dimension, by including a historical dimension.
- Source for the claims made about the power plant: de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oulu…