Eco-hydraulic survey of streams and rivers highly exploited for hydropower in the Central Italian Alps

The assessment of appropriate environmental flows (e-flows) to mitigate the impact of hydropower diversion on the aquatic environment is still controversial. One of the main obstacles to defining the e-flows is represented by the difficulty in establishing clear and measurable environmental objectives of the water releases below diversion works. To contribute to this discussion, we provide a summary of our four years (2009-2012) eco-hydraulic field investigation on thirteen watercourses in the Central Italian Alps, where water exploitation mainly focuses on hydropower.