[env-trinity] Public at Arcata meeting unified in desire for Klamath dam removal

[Tom Stokely]

http://www.times-standard.com/general-news/20160125/public-at-arcata-meeting-unified-in-desire-for-klamath-dam-removal


Public at Arcata meeting unified in desire for Klamath dam removal

State water officials hear testimony on PacifiCorp relicensing
By Will Houston, Eureka Times-StandardMonday, January 25, 2016Though coming from different backgrounds, professions, and cultures, the nearly 30 speakers at the California Water Resource’s Control Board meeting in Arcata on Monday evening were all unified by one goal: the removal of four Klamath River dams.“Allowing Klamath salmon to go extinct because these four dams were allowed to stand would represent one of the clearest and most egregious irretrievable commitments in the history of environmental analysis, in my opinion,” Klamath Riverkeeper Project Manager Erica Terence said, speaking as a private citizen.The State Water Board’s Monday scoping meeting at the D Street Community Center was held to gain input from the public as it prepares its environmental review of PacifiCorp’s Klamath Hydroelectric Project, which includes four Klamath River dams — Copco 1, Copco 2, Iron Gate and J.C. Boyle — once slated for removal by now failed Klamath Basin agreements. PacifiCorp is seeking to obtain a Clean Water Act permit from the state as part of a larger dam relicensing effort at the federal level through the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. The project has not been relicensed since 1956.Based in Portland and a subsidiary of American businessman Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Energy, PacifiCorp had been undergoing the relicensing process for several years until delaying it after signing on to the first of the three Klamath Basin agreements, the Klamath Hydroelectric Settlement Agreement (KHSA). The KHSA called for the removal of the four PacifiCorp dams by 2020 in exchange for limiting PacifiCorp’s liability to about $200 million. The two other agreements — the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement and Upper Klamath Basin Comprehensive Agreement — would have sought to resolve water rights issues between tribes and irrigators, provide environmental protections and ensure water certainty for Klamath Basin agriculture.However, after Congress failed to pass the agreements by Jan. 1 this year, PacifiCorp resumed its relicensing process. Having gone through much of the relicensing process already, the last major hurdles the company faces are obtaining Clean Water Act permits through the California Water Resources Control Board and from the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality.The California Water Board was in Arcata on Monday for a scoping meeting to hear from the public and stakeholders as it prepares its environmental impact report for the dam’s Clean Water Act permit. From tribal members to fishermen to environmentalists to politicians, every public speaker that attended the meeting stated the only way to protect water quality and resources as prescribed under the California Clean Water Act was through full removal of the four dams.California 2nd District Congressman Jared Huffman’s District Representative John Driscoll read a statement from Huffman, which acknowledged that the Klamath Basin agreements are now “dead” and called upon the State Water Board to demand dam removal.“Nothing short of an aggressive approach will do here,” Huffman wrote in his statement.The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission evaluated six alternative actions in its own environmental review of the dams, ranging from leaving the dams as is or removing the four hydroelectric dams altogether. There were also alternatives that kept the dams in place, but with changes. PacifiCorp’s own proposal would include installation of fish ladders, oxygenation of Iron Gate Reservoir, flow alterations, and gravel replacement among nearly 40 other changes. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s environmental review of the dams shows that the company would lose more than $20 million per year if they reopened the dams with some of these conditions, but recommended the dams stay in place.Yurok Senior Fisheries Biologist Mike Belchik said the impacts the dams have on the river — including temperature, flow, nutrients and sediment — are having serious consequences on downstream salmonids, especially with disease and parasitic outbreaks like ich. Over 90 percent of diseased juvenile salmon the tribe surveyed in the river last year succumbed to their illness, Belchik said. Belchik said that the alternative options don’t go far enough to address these impacts and that there is no way to mitigate them except through full dam removal.“There is not enough cold water in the reservoir,” he said, referring to Iron Gate.Stillwater Sciences senior fish biologist Joshua Strange said the reservoirs behind the dams also affect spawning salmon upstream migration patterns in the river, with the fish now pausing their migration for about a week at the start of the fall season when they would normally still be moving. Strange said this is occurring because the reservoir water is warmed up as it sits behind dams like Iron Gate. Upon release downstream, the reservoir water is warmer than it normally would be during the start of fall, and the fish react by waiting for the cooler waters.“This is a big contributor in my mind as to why ich outbreak has occurred in the lower Klamath River,” he said. “It’s the only place this disease has ever occurred in a migrating salmon population. Otherwise, it only occurs when fish are stationary.”Cultural impacts were also a major talking point, with several local tribal members explaining how the conditions of the river have made cultural ceremonies or activities difficult or impossible. Yurok tribal member and Cultural Resources Manager Rosie Clayburn said that part of praying is actually interacting with the water, but that people are now walking out of the water with rashes from irritants like algae.“We don’t even have the water flow to do that,” she said. “We can’t even put a boat in to go down. We actually have to request water releases to have that done.”The State Water Board is set to hold another scoping meeting in Orleans this morning from 10 a.m. to noon at the Karuk Tribe Community Room. Written comments on the State Water Board’s environmental impact review preparations are due by 5 p.m. on Jan. 29.More information on the project and written comment submittals can be found online at http://www.waterboards.ca.gov/waterrights/water_issues/programs/water_quality_cert/klamath_ferc2082.shtml  URL: http://www.times-standard.com/general-news/20160125/public-at-arcata-meeting-unified-in-desire-for-klamath-dam-removal© 2016 Eureka Times-Standard (http://www.times-standard.com)
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