The World Bank is taking a renewed role in hydropower development, driven it part by estimates that the developing world has 1,333 GW of potential and unexploited hydro capacity. Some NGOs, however, don’t believe large scale hydropower is the answer for rural electrification and say the World Bank's number would be much lower if negative social and economic impacts were taken into consideration.

Leslie Berliant reports for SolveClimate July 31, 2009. [2]