Seven interior Columbia River basin salmon and steelhead species listed as threatened or endangered under the federal Endangered Species Act should retain their current listing status, according to five-year status reviews released by NOAA Fisheries. The listed species are in the mid- and upper-Columbia River basin and the Snake River basin.
U.S. District Court Judge Michael H. Simon this morning agreed to a request by the Biden Administration and plaintiffs to extend for another year the stay in the litigation challenging the federal government’s environmental impact statement and biological opinion for Columbia/Snake river salmon and steelhead. The parties want more time to identify “comprehensive” solutions to basin salmon recovery.
Washington state’s Gov. Jay Inslee and U.S. Sen. Patty Murray have released the draft “Lower Snake River Dams: Benefit Replacement Draft Report” that examines whether there are reasonable means for replacing the dams’ benefits so that breaching could be part of a comprehensive salmon recovery strategy for the Pacific Northwest. The report says ‘benefit replacement’ could cost as much $30 billion.
The Water Resources Development Act of 2022 approved by the House of Representatives Wednesday includes a lengthy section called “Columbia River Basin Restoration” and would require an inter-agency assessment of the four lower Snake River dams’ impact on fish and wildlife.
The Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission this week presented its “2022 Energy Vision For The Columbia River Basin” to the Northwest Power and Conservation Council, with recommendations to get “energy production off the backs of salmon.”
Northwest Power and Conservation Council staff discussed with the Council’s power committee this week a proposed seven-phase, scope-of-work plan to evaluate what it would take to replace the “power system services” provided by the Lower Snake River dams, and the feedback staff has received.
As a Fish and Wildlife Biologist for the Walla Walla District, Corps of Engineers from 1971 to 2000, I was there when disinformation and misinformation began to spread and hints of breaching the four lower Snake River dams started.
Most everyone watching the dam/salmon drama will be surprised to learn that the litigants in the decades-long case, have never asked for dam breaching as a solution to the problem. Never.
A draft scoping plan to study the impacts on the Northwest power system of removing four lower Snake River dams and replacing the dams’ generating output is running up against stiff opposition from utilities and some members of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.