At last, a way to transport spawning fish over a dam safely: The Whooshh Passage Portal by Whooshh Innovations in Seattle, New Atlas reports. 

It works like this: Water continuously flows out of a “fishway” at the bottom end of the portal at the base of the dam. The fish who are swimming upstream are drawn to the outflowing water instinctively, and swim right up the chute. 

They pass through a recognition scanner, where cameras take only 1 second to catch 18 photos, which a computer analyzes for size, species, etc. Then the fish pass into a pneumatic tube that uses air pressure to transport them up to the top of the dam (air misted all the way), and over, to continue happily upstream.

And, this handy-dandy system also sorts out “undesirable” fish, which are diverted back to the water below the dam.  

“We know that hydropower is the largest producer of renewable energy in the world,” Whooshh says, “and so we committed ourselves to finding a better way for hydropower and healthy native fish populations to coexist.” And so they did. (Photos: Whooshh Innovations)