PUBLIC OPINION ABOUT EFFECTS OF ENERGY INVESTMENTS IN ARTVIN, TURKEY

The energy which has been one of the basic needs of mankind since the early ages. Demand for energy is continuously increasing in parallel with the developing technology and increasing population. Energy demand's being that high especially in the last two centuries increased the demand for fossil fuels. However, these fuels we had excessively used without considering their harm as a non-consumable source to the environment and human health. So, the interest in renewable energy resources such as hydraulic, wind, geothermal, solar, biomass, wave, hydrogen has increased. The industrialization process of Turkey, which is a developing country, continues and the energy demand increases with every passing day. 35.36% of this increasing energy need is obtained from hydroelectric power plants (HEPPs), 29.01% from natural gas, 20.63% from coal and 15% from other energy resources (wind, geothermal, liquid fuels, solar energy, renewable waste). In Turkey, as being one of these energy resources, hydroelectric power plants are established in many valleys and every day projects are developed to add new ones to these. The most important one of the rivers on which HEPPs were and are being intensively built in our country is the Çoruh River. Many HEPP investments have been made in the Çoruh River since 1998. In this study, it has been aimed to determine the opinions of people on the socio-cultural, economic, ecological and environmental effects of dam-type and run-of-the-river HEPPs which were built and are being built in Artvin province in which a big part of the Çoruh River is located. For this purpose, a survey has been conducted by 142 people living in Artvin. Based on the results of the survey, participants stated that HEPPs have many negative effects on ecological characteristics such as climate, forest structure, agricultural lands, flora and fauna; on environmental characteristics such as erosion, pollution and visual quality and social characteristics such as migration and cultural heritage. On the other hand, HEPPs positively affects economic characteristics such as employment, tourism and fishing.