[1] BPA, Corps Make Deal With Tribes Over 2007 Dam Operations

The Bonneville Power Administration and the Corps of Engineers have gone directly to lower Columbia and Colville tribal authorities to work out a deal for operating mainstem Columbia and Snake River dams in 2007.

The agreement, which all parties signed by Dec. 29, calls for river operations to remain pretty much the same as last year, with some added spill and BPA funding for several million dollars in tribal projects trimmed during last year's F&W budget process.

Lorri Bodi, senior policy advisor at BPA, told NW Fishletter that the tribes have agreed to support these operations in 2007 as being "adequate for fish."

That means the tribes aren't expected to support any motion by plaintiffs in the ongoing hydro BiOp litigation for other changes to 2007 river operations.

Plaintiff environmental and fishing groups were expected to push for more operations that they consider beneficial to fish passage. Some participants in the remand policy discussions thought that enviros would ask for changes in reservoir elevations that could reduce flexibility in the hydro system.

In the past two years, while the BiOp has been going through a lengthy remand process, the groups have asked for more spill and flow augmentation. Federal District Court Judge James Redden has granted them more summer spill, but balked at augmenting flows.

The added spill at three lower Snake dams and at the McNary Dam on the mainstem Columbia has kept more fish from being transported by barge through the hydro system, the feds' preferred operation.

The 2005 order called for spilling all water in excess of station service at the three collector dams. With summer flows in the 50-kcfs range, spill would range from about 64 to 70 percent of the water passing the dams.

The new agreement calls for even more spill, mostly in the summer, in addition the big boost over the past two years. That includes 14 more nights' worth of spill at Little Goose Dam on the Snake, designed to reduce the number of fish barged from that dam.

Bodi said the agreement also calls for the barging of fish to start later than most previous years, maybe not until May 1. Researchers have found that the earliest barged fish do poorly compared to later groups, and NMFS has recommended in recent years delaying the Corps' transportation program by several weeks.

In 2005, Judge Redden okayed more summer spill for Snake River fall chinook, so more smolts would migrate inriver than federal authorities had planned. The feds wanted to stick with their maximized barging policy, though there was little direct evidence that it really improved survival, other than the fact that the fall run had been improving since the late 1990s.

Also, BPA intends to fund several million dollars' worth of F&W proposals that were nixed in the budget process completed by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council by the end of the year. Bodi said the money would be in addition to the millions already earmarked for fish and wildlife funding.

Some business interests seemed pleased with the deal. Terry Flores, executive director of Northwest RiverPartners, said the collaboration was "a good sign" that things could still be worked out without having to go to court.

But that didn't mean environmental groups wouldn't pursue a motion on their own, even without support of the tribes. It had been rumored that lead attorney Todd True would be asking for more complicated dam operations that involve changes in reservoir operations to MIP [minimum irrigation pool] and MOP [minimum operating pool] at some mainstem reservoirs, which the groups claim would improve fish survival by increasing water velocity through the reservoirs. Such a plan has been pushed by the state of Oregon in policy talks over the hydro BiOp remand.

BPA wasn't keen on the idea because lower reservoir levels would reduce their operating flexibility, particularly during load following operations (But it was also reported that BPA's own estimate of power losses from the changes were not expected to be much, though a specific amount was not mentioned). One source did say that the agency made a preliminary estimate of 1500 MW of lost flexibility if the MOP and MIP changes were adopted.

But Flores did say her group still had concerns that the court-mandated dam operations were costing too much with little or no benefits to fish. She pointed to the installation in recent years of removable spillway weirs at two dams on the Snake, which allow more fish to pass dams with less spill than standard spillway passage. But with the court-mandated summer spill program, the RSWs are not being used effectively.

BPA pegged the added summer spill cost at $74 million in 2005, but hasn't released the 2006 figure yet. It's due out soon in an after action report. Before the summer spill season started last year, the agency had estimated that the added cost would be in the $46-million to $60-million range.

With research into fall chinook survival complicated by low numbers of juveniles, and now by a portion of the run that dawdles around the reservoirs for most of the winter, no one can point to any data that shows barging is better than inriver migration.

Some recent results, on the skimpy side, showed that survival to adulthood from the two passage routes was nearly identical. However, the latest research shows that Snake fall chinook which leave late in the year, or overwinter in the hydro system or estuary, get no benefit from the spill program, yet they make up most of the adult returns.

BPA funding will also pick up some projects that lower Columbia tribes wanted, but didn't get in the regular budget process, said Charles Hudson, spokesman for the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission. He said about 18 projects would either be revived or receive "bridge" funding for another year, including the Yakama coho project and work on mussels and lamprey, along with funding for conservation enforcement.

However, environmental and fishing groups involved in the hydro remand decided not to ask BiOp judge James Redden for more dam measures to aid fish this year, according to a notice filed a Jan. 12 in Federal District Court.

The groups said even if they asked for more spill at dams, it likely would not have occurred because of the way the gas caps are determined. Spill is limited to 120 percent dissolved gas levels in dam tailraces and 115 percent in dam forebays. Citing an analysis from the Fish Passage Center, they said limiting forebay levels to 115 percent kept about 4.4 MAF of court-ordered spill from occurring in the spring of 2006.

The notice also said the recent agreement between five tribes, BPA, and the Corps of Engineers over 2007 river operations doesn't mean that the tribes believe this coming year's operations are adequate for the long-term. -Bill Rudolph

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