The dam decommission is vital to restoring the
Klamath River, which for years has been the
subject of bitter feuding among farmers,
fishermen and American Indian interests.
It would open historic salmon spawning and rearing
grounds on the upper reaches of the river,
which winds from southern Oregon through the Cascade
and Coast ranges to California's Pacific coast.
"We can't restore the river solely by removing the
dams, but we can't restore the Klamath without
removing the dams," said Steve Rothert of
American Rivers, one of 26 parties negotiating the dam settlement.
Backers say the decommissioning — which will require
federal approval — would be the largest and most
complex dam-removal project in the United States.
"We're about to make changes to the Klamath basin
that will be observable from space," said
Craig Tucker of the Karuk Tribe of American Indians.
For PacifiCorp, consenting to the end of the J.C.
Boyle, Copco Nos. 1 and 2, and Iron Gate dams
ultimately was a business decision. The utility,
a subsidiary of billionaire investor Warren Buffett's
Berkshire Hathaway empire, faced litigation and
expensive relicensing requirements for the dams, the oldest of which dates to 1918.
"As a utility we don't typically take dams out,"
said Dean Brockbank, PacifiCorp's lead negotiator.
"We have achieved an agreement that is
in the best interest of our customers —
the lowest cost and risk compared to the alternative."
Under the draft settlement, which the parties hope
to sign by the end of the year, PacifiCorp would
continue to operate the dams until 2020.
Then they would transfer the hydropower
facilities to another entity, probably the
federal government, for dismantling.
The U.S. Department of Interior has to make a
determination that the dam removal will be in
the public interest, a signoff that Brockbank said
is not guaranteed but that the company expects to get.
"This agreement marks the beginning of a new
chapter for the Klamath River and for the communities
whose health and way of life depend on it,"
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said in a statement.
The settlement terms call for PacifiCorp ratepayers
in Oregon and California to pay a surcharge to finance
a company contribution of up to $200 million for dam
removal and river-channel restoration. The state of California
would provide as much as $250 million in bond money.
"We're hopeful this will result in dam removal,
but a number of things have to occur before
that can happen," said Kirk Miller, deputy secretary
of the California Natural Resources Agency.
"It is a complicated matter."
The dams, which range in height from 33 feet to
173 feet and are spread across 65 miles of the Klamath,
haven't just kept chinook and coho salmon out of the upper river
and its tributaries. They also have hurt water quality.
In the summer, stagnant pools of warm water behind
the dams become a breeding ground for toxic algae.
The Klamath basin made national headlines early
this decade when federal water managers cut
irrigation deliveries to preserve fish flows,
sparking irate protests from farming interests.
The following year, when more water was released
to agriculture, tens of thousands of salmon died,
floating in the river's warm,
shallow waters and washing up on its banks.
"We are redefining what restoration and collaboration
means," said Chuck Bonham of Trout Unlimited.
Along with the Columbia and Sacramento rivers,
the Klamath traditionally has been one of the country's
most productive salmon rivers. But West Coast salmon stocks
have been in such poor shape the past three years that
California has canceled its commercial salmon-fishing season.
The Klamath has "been dammed and polluted nearly to death,"
said Glen Spain, northwest regional director of the
Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations.
The dam settlement follows an earlier restoration
agreement also due to be signed by the end of the year.
The restoration proposal has come under fire from
environmental groups that complain it preserves
irrigation deliveries for Klamath basin farms at the
expense of fish and allows continued
farming in wildlife refuges with critical wetlands.
"Dam removal is still tied to this albatross,
"said Steve Pedery of Oregon Wild.
Jeffrey Mount, director of the Center for Integrated
Watershed Science and Management at the University of California,
Davis, and a member of the American Rivers board, warned
that tearing down the dams would not solve all the
Klamath's water-quality problems.
"There is this assumption that a miracle will occur
when the dams come down. Removal of the dams
does not address the broader problems of the basin."
He described Upper Klamath Lake, which feeds the
river, as a "big, warm, green pile of goo" that could
make things worse for fish once the dams are gone.
Still, he said, "This is incredibly exciting."