Tropical hydroelectric dams are now one of the main destinations for funds under the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), with 1482 dams approved for credit and 840 dams in the CDM ‘pipeline’ awaiting approval. Thousands of dams are being built by countries such as China, India and Brazil, irrespective of any additional subsidy based on mitigation of climate change. Carbon credit granted to projects that would occur anyway allows the countries purchasing the credit to emit greenhouse gases that are not offset. Damage to global climate is further increased by CDM accounting procedures that undercount the greenhouse gases emitted by tropical dams. Still more damage stems from the limited mitigation funds being squandered on ‘nonadditional’ projects such as dams. An example indicating the need to eliminate credit for hydroelectric dams is provided by the Jirau Dam, now nearing completion on the Madeira River near Brazil’s border with Bolivia. The dam has severe impacts in addition to climate change. The project was approved (registered) by the CDM Executive Board on 17 May 2013.