Land use change around hydroelectric dams using Landsat multi-temporal data: a challenge for a sustainable environment in Mexico

Abstract

Dams must provide human development with economic viability, social equitability, and be environmentally sustainable However, environmental and social impacts are often negative and seldom considered in the design of these projects. We made a multitemporal analysis classifying 26 satellite images of several Mexican hydroelectric power stations between 1972 and 2016 to evaluate the effect of dams on the change in land use. Eleven socio-economic indicators were also compared before and after the construction of the dam to document effects on local communities. We use the Land Change Modeler to quantify the net changes in land use and land cover. We found a mean decrease in tropical forest (1,404.19 km²) and temperate forest (1,191.26 km²) and an increase in agriculture (2,241.26 km²) and urban use (92.9 km²). The results also show that although some indicators improved, the environmental deterioration around these projects shows that they are not sustainable.

Graphical Abstract

Keywords:

• Environmental impact
• hydroelectric dam
• Landsat
• Mexico
• remote sensing
• sustainability

Acknowledgements

We would like thank to Consejo Nacional de Ciencia y Tecnología (CONACyT) that supported the study through the scholarship (ZZG-585490) and to Universidad Autónoma de Estado de México. We also thank Carl Mitchell for comments on sentence structure and language. We thank to two anonymous reviewers. This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Disclosure statement

No potential competing interest was reported by the authors.

Data available within the article or its supplementary materials

The authors confirm that the data supporting the findings of this study are available within the article [and/or] its supplementary materials.