[env-trinity] Disease killing young Klamath River salmon

Sat May 23 12:44:08 PDT 2015

No, simply incurring relicensing costs doesn't mean the PUC allows them to be imposed on ratepayers. These costs would be unreasonable for the power involved and could not be approved. This is why the PUCs have allowed the dam removal cost surcharges to be imposed instead. It's why PacifiCorp favors removal too, though they want it delayed as long as possible.

Sent from my phone

On May 23, 2015, at 8:35 AM, Kier Associates <kierassociates at att.net<mailto:kierassociates at att.net>> wrote:

Greg

One comment:

The fish/river conservation community did in fact sort of dance in the street when the administrative law judge ruled for the fish agencies that PacifiCorp would have to build fish ladders/somehow provide fish passage on the river – but that’s because members of the fish conservation community by and large don’t understand how the states regulate utilities like PacifiCorp.

Those fish-ladders/whatever would have clearly been a cost of doing business, recoverable by PacifiCorp through its rate base. That is, rate-payers would have paid for those fish-passage facilities. PacifiCorp would have not only passed those costs on to its ratepayers with the express permission of the two state PUCs but would have collected its usual profit (something like 9 percent at the time of the administrative law judge’s ruling) on that $400 million.

‘Not making a case for the KBRA here but simply trying to expose my fish-conservation brothers and sisters to the mysterious ways of state-regulated utilities economics

(I do agree that winning the Section 401 Clean Water Act permit from the states needed to complete the hydro project relicensing process, would have been a near impossibility given just how solid the cooperation was among the Tribes, the states and the fish agencies in documenting and communicating the adverse water quality impact of PacifiCorp’s project. But I think it’s also worth noting that we have some PG&E hydro projects in CA, for which relicensing has not been completed, that are running on yr-to-yr permission from FERC – and have been doing so for decades)

‘Best,

Bill Kier
From: env-trinity [mailto:env-trinity-bounces+kierassociates=att.net at velocipede.dcn.davis.ca.us] On Behalf Of Greg King
Sent: Thursday, May 21, 2015 4:36 PM
To: Thomas P. Schlosser
Cc: env-trinity at velocipede.dcn.davis.ca.us<mailto:env-trinity at velocipede.dcn.davis.ca.us>
Subject: Re: [env-trinity] Disease killing young Klamath River salmon

Too bad all the alleged "greens" and tribal reps bought the PacifiCorp/Bush Administration lie that negotiating with them for the KBRA — rather than insisting that PC build the court-ordered fish ladders, whose nearly $400 million cost could have cajoled PC to tear down the dams, which weren't worth that much; and rather than continue to pursue the required 401 Certification for the dams, which would have been very difficult for PC to obtain given the virtual impossibility of the water behind the dams satisfying this provision of the Clean Water Act; and rather than enforcing the ESA biological opinion requirement of a minimum flow of 1,000 cfs at Iron Gate — would be the Klamath's panacea rather than its undoing, as we're seeing today with PC's and the irrigators' ongoing water grab. Combine this folly with the underhandedness of many if not most of the people who negotiated in favor of the corporate-government deal and it's no wonder that today almost no one wants to step up to defend the beleaguered Klamath. What a mess.

Thank you Tom, and the Hoopa Tribe, for continuing to move forward with integrity.

Greg King

On May 21, 2015, at 9:57 AM, Thomas P. Schlosser <t.schlosser at msaj.com<mailto:t.schlosser at msaj.com>> wrote:

I grabbed the wrong KPOP by mistake; the 2015 Annual Operations Plan, page 2, calls for diverting 254,500 af to irrigation, a policy choice to favor irrigation over fisheries requirements.
On 5/21/2015 8:09 AM, Thomas P. Schlosser wrote:
It's worth remebering that when Reclamation says (below) that there's too little water to help now ("We decided that is not the most optimal use of a very short water supply at this point,” Person said.") they are still using a 2014 Annual Operations Plan for the Klamath Project which, at page 2 calculates the project supply of water to be diverted from the Klamath at 239,000 acre-feet. This is what they consider to be "most optimal."
Tom
On 5/21/2015 6:32 AM, Tom Stokely wrote:
http://www.redding.com/news/local-news/disease-killing-young-klamath-river-salmon_18847031

Disease killing young Klamath River salmon
Damon Arthur
5:50 PM, May 20, 2015
5:51 PM, May 20, 2015
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 <~WRD000.jpg>
Copyright 2015 Journal Media Group. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
JEFF BARNARD/AP PHOTO
SHOW CAPTION
KLAMATH RIVER, California - A disease flourishing in warm drought conditions in the Klamath River is killing young salmon and steelhead trying to migrate out to sea.
And while in some sections of the river disease has been found in nearly all of the fish tested, U.S. Bureau of Reclamation officials also said Wednesday the drought has left little water available to send downstream to improve conditions.
The Klamath Fish Health Assessment Team says conditions in the river are at orange, which means a fish kill is likely and federal and state agencies need to be alerted.
“Orange is probably underplaying the crisis,” said Craig Tucker, natural resources policy advocate for the Karuk Tribe, one of several groups with the assessment team that has biologists monitoring the river.
Scott Foott, project leader for the California-Nevada Fish Health Center in Anderson, said about 90 percent of the fish from Klamath brought to his center for testing have the disease, called ceratonova Shasta.
Foott didn’t know how many fish were dying of the disease in the river, but said mortality rate among fish with the disease is very high. Fish biologists said conditions in the river are bad this year because of the lack of rain and runoff from snowmelt.
Randy Turner, the fish health assessment team coordinator, said with low flows and warm water, worms that carry the disease have flourished on the streambed.
The problem isn’t as bad in years when the river is cooler and runs higher and faster in the winter and spring because the current kicks up the gravel and cobble on the streambed, disrupting the worms’ life cycle, he said.
The worst section of the Klamath River is from the Shasta River west of Interstate 5 to more than 80 miles downstream to the Salmon River, Turner said.
Brian Person, acting area manager of the bureau’s Yreka office, said Wednesday that after consulting with other agencies, they could not send more water downstream to improve conditions for the fish.
“We decided that is not the most optimal use of a very short water supply at this point,” Person said.
The bureau, as well as other federal and state wildlife agencies, would continue to monitor the fish in the river and could at some point decide to send more water downstream if conditions change, Person said.
If the readiness level on the river goes from orange to red — which means a fish kill is occurring — there is probably little officials can do because so little water is available upstream in the river, Tucker said.
Even if more water was sent downstream there probably isn’t enough available to benefit the young salmon, Tucker said. And if they use extra water in the spring to help the young salmon swimming out to sea, there might not be enough water in the fall to help the salmon returning from the ocean to spawn.
During the past few years bureau officials have had to release more water from the Trinity River to prevent a different disease from killing spawning salmon in the Klamath. That disease, called “ich,” has affected areas below where the Trinity flows into the Klamath River.
The young fish dying from the ceratonova Shasta in the Klamath River are upstream of its confluence with the Trinity River, Turner said.
It is likely a large percentage of this year’s salmon hatch will not make it out to sea, which means there will be fewer adult salmon returning back upstream to spawn in three years, Tucker said.
“I think we’re definitely going to take a hit when the adults return,” he said.
Copyright 2015 Journal Media Group. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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Greg King
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Siskiyou Land Conservancy
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