The mountains of North Korea are crisscrossed with swift rivers, large and small. Their hydropower potential is such that ninety percent of the electricity on the Korean Peninsula prior to partition came from the North.1 But under the Kim family dynasty, the North Korean government has failed to build or maintain a reliable national electricity grid linked to hydroelectric dams, many of which are located in remote areas. When the Soviet Union stopped supplying cheap fuel oil in the early 1990s, city-based, oil-powered generators sputtered to a halt. The lights went out across much of the
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