I was active in fighting agains the Bős-Nagymaros Dam project in the 1980s and 1990s. The project aimed at constructing a huge, artificial system consisting of a canal and two dams for electricity production. It was not only highly destructive in environmental and cultural sense but also economically irrational because it required about USD 3 billion for the completion, but this investment would never recovered through the benefit of electricity production. Alternative Nobel-Prize winner and environmentalist Janos Vargha, the leader of the Danube Circle once said to me: “If we stop this project, this is the biggest business as we can save USD 3 billion for Hungary and get the Danube free.” Finally we won the case and I understood that avoiding losses and eliminating future sufferings of human and non-human beings is really a big business. Our greatest achievement is that today there is no damaging, artificial contruction exists on the site of Nagymaros, the place of the project. The city is aspiring for becoming a natural, Slow City.
