[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
[2] Niners Say BPA Must Continue Fish Passage Center Funding
A three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit Court ruled yesterday that BPA illegally cut funding to the Fish Passage Center after report language in a Congressional spending bill ordered them to end support for the 11-person group. The language was added to the bill by Idaho Sen. Larry Craig (R) who was furious that FPC analyses of fish survival were used by environmental groups in their successful push to get a federal judge to boost spill at federal dams, part of ongoing litigation over hydro operations on the Columbia and Snake rivers.
The FPC was scheduled to be defunded by last March, but the Niners ruled then that the power marketing agency had to keep the Center going until the court decided the case, which was brought by the Northwest Environmental Defense Center, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, the Northwest Sportfishing Industry Association and the Yakama Indian Nation.
The Court ruled that the report language does not carry the force of law. It also said that BPA did not show a "rational basis" for transferring FPC data gathering and analysis functions to the Pacific States Marine Fish Commission and Battelle and ordered that BPA must continue funding and supporting the FPC "unless and until it has established a proper basis for displacing the FPC."
"It's clearly another disappointing decision on the Ninth Circuit level," said Craig spokesman Dan Whiting. He said the effect of the decision on the use of report language is unclear at this point, but noted that the vast majority of directions for spending levels comes in congressional report language. "The result could be a tilt in power," he said, noting that Craig's language that killed FPC funding was included in the original spending bill, and could have been questioned or deleted any number of times by other members of Congress. -B. R.
[3] Corps Says No Flex In 2007 Libby Dam Operations
The Corps of Engineers announced Jan. 5 that it would operate Montana's Libby Dam under "strict" VARQ [Variable Discharge] guidelines in 2007, after last year's flexible operations backfired and caused tens of millions of dollars in flood damage to crops and dikes near Bonners Ferry, Idaho.
"Public life and safety--people and their dwellings--is our first priority," said Brig. Gen. Gregg Martin, commander of the Corps' Northwestern Division, in a press release. "We are responsible to minimize the risk to the public as we operate for local and flood damage reduction, provide flows for threatened and endangered species and meet other project purposes."
The Corps admitted the screw-up in an after-action report issued last November. The agency said if it had followed strict VARQ guidelines last spring, no flooding would have occurred. But dam operators kept the reservoir elevation behind Libby higher than strict VARQ would have allowed to provide more spring spawning flows in the Kootenai River for ESA-listed sturgeon, and to provide a little extra for salmon flows in the mainstem Columbia later in the summer.
But a late spring storm and heavy rain forced dam operators to spill extra water at Libby for weeks, gassing ESA-listed trout downstream, causing widespread crop damage and further weakening more than 50 miles of already substandard dikes.
The agency has spent more than $3 million studying the use of VARQ at Libby, rather than the standard flood control operations that were in effect before 2003. The standard operations offered a more cautious approach to flood control.
At the January meeting of the Implementation Team in Portland, where mid-level agency policymakers heard about the Corps' decision, it was reported that VARQ operations result in only a 6 percent likelihood of reservoir refill, while standard flood control operations doubled that chance of refill.
"We may have less water available for salmon flows this year," said Eric Braun, a fish program planner with the Corps.
However, in water years that are essentially average, the amount that VARQ protocols leave in Libby for ESA salmon needs will likely be close to the same amount that standard flood control procedures would produce.
Since last November, the Corps' water supply forecast for Libby inflows changed considerably. On Nov. 1, the agency expected a 90 percent of average water year; but a month later, it had jumped to 122 percent. The Corps' latest forecast calls for 110 percent of average.
The forecast from the National Weather Service's River Forecast Center, issued Jan. 8, pegged Jan.-July Libby inflows at 103 percent.
The Corps' representative Braun said 2007 Libby operations will strictly adhere to the established rule curve with the latest forecast.
The Weather Service has been under some pressure from local residents to reduce the official flood level for the Kootenai River at Bonners Ferry by two feet. The Corps says it will operate Libby at or below the current official flood stage level of 1,764 feet in 2007 because that was the designated level when the decision document was signed.
The river level remained right at the 1,764-foot level for over a month at Bonners Ferry, when dam operators were trying to get the reservoir back to a manageable level.
The state had asked the Federal Emergency Management Agency for financial aid to pay for damages, but was turned down in December. Darrell Kirby, the mayor of Bonners Ferry, told NW Fishletter that the federal agency said the region did not sustain enough damage in the categories they had money for, nor did FEMA have any money at all for dike repair.
The strict VARQ decision is only for 2007. The Corps says a long-term decision will require more evaluation, and would be addressed in the "upcoming" Record of Decision for upper Columbia alternative flood control and a fish operations environmental impact statement.
Several environmental groups have already said they intend to sue the Corps unless Libby operations are made more fish-friendly. Last year, some resident fish, including ESA-listed bull trout, died from gas bubble disease incurred during the high spill episode.
The Corps admits its operations killed some fish, damaged dikes and ruined crops (mainly hops). But it still won't help pay to improve the dikes, noting that it is not a federal responsibility. The price tag for bringing them up to current standards has been estimated at about a million dollars per mile for the 54 miles of protective levees.
Another cost of the Corp's Libby operation that hasn't been discussed much is the lost power revenue by not releasing water earlier in the spring, which critics say added up to about $20 million.
The states of Montana and Idaho have urged the Corps to implement VARQ in 2007, as long as there is protection from damaging floods. NOAA Fisheries and the Northwest Power and Conservation Council also support VARQ, but BC Hydro told the Corps last July it supported a return to standard flood control operations until VARQ was further reviewed. -B. R.
[4] Feds Approve Puget Sound Recovery Plan, But Much Uncertainty Remains
NOAA Fisheries has formally accepted the salmon recovery plan for ESA-listed Puget Sound chinook and bull trout written by a huge group of regional players over the past few years that came together in a forum called the Shared Strategy. State and county agencies, municipalities, conservation and fishing groups, business interests, along with several tribes, worked together on different levels, including the 14 watersheds, estuaries and nearshore regions, to craft a plan they say will take decades, or maybe even a hundred years to recover the salmon stocks.
It was billed last week as the "most comprehensive" salmon recovery plan ever approved by the feds. "This is a plan built on local salmon-recovery efforts and remarkable cooperation among state, tribal and local governments and others," said Bob Lohn, head of the NOAA Fisheries Northwest regional office. "You can't get a better foundation for recovery than that."
The plan has outlined restoration efforts over the next 10 years, with a billion-dollar price tag attached to it, twice the current spending. Planners say they expect fish numbers to improve by about 20 percent over the next decade if funding is boosted to $120 million a year.
"There is no exact modeling on this," said Jim Kramer, the Shared Strategy's executive director in an email, "but we expect to get the most gains where there is major restoration of estuaries. This would include the Skagit, Snohomish, Nisqually and Dungeness. There will also be a projected thirty-percent increase in the Nooksack with the removal of the dam on the mid-fork Nooksack."
But one of the basic tools used to analyze the 14 different watersheds is still under review, and until that is cleared up, some scientists say there is still a fair amount of uncertainty over the results. The model used to examine potential productivity gains is complicated and though widely used, still has never undergone a truly independent peer review.
It's called EDT, [Ecosystem Diagnosis and Treatment Model] and it has been a major tool in the development of fish recovery plans throughout the Northwest, sometimes supplemented by other analyses, especially when its results have raised eyebrows too far. The Sound's own technical review team revised historical productivity numbers downward for some river systems when EDT had them pegged up to 10 times higher.
NOAA Fisheries ecologist Paul McElhany said he is in the midst of such a sensitivity analysis to determine how well EDT's complicated parameters actually rate to fish performance. The EDT process examines streams in small pieces and analyses them according to 45 different attributes, a data-intensive exercise grafted on to many places where data is scant at best. Without much data, analysts are expected to add their "expert opinion," which critics say increases uncertainty even more for the non-statistically-based analysis.
But EDT supporters say that was one of the reasons why the tool was developed in the first place, to come up with some answers for lack of anything better.
However, McElhany said uncertainty in a model like EDT can add up fast and create much larger uncertainties by the time all factors are included in an analysis that complicated.
A 2000 review by an expert panel put together by NMFS wasn't too impressed by EDT. The panel said EDT "exemplifies how modeling should not be done. It is over-parameterized, includes key functional relationships that cannot be known and cannot be tested, creates a false sense of accuracy, yet introduces error and uncertainty. Its very complexity makes it difficult to determine the effect of various assumptions and parameter values on the model's behavior and relation to data. The attempt at quantification through subjective 'expert opinion' compounds these fatal weaknesses, especially the model's inability to confront and improve with confrontation of data."
As a member of the Willamette/Lower Columbia region's technical recovery team, NOAA Fisheries' McElhany has had previous first hand experience with EDT, which was used extensively in the analyses of Lower Columbia stocks and habitat. EDT estimates of potential fish numbers were judged to be somewhat optimistic and were only adopted to represent the high end of planning ranges. Because of EDT's inherent uncertainty, The Dec. 2004 report said its value was not to come up with specific goals, but to estimate general magnitudes of populations between historic and current conditions, and to determine different impacts to fish throughout their lives and "the degree to which recovery measures at particular life stages will improve the potential for population persistence."
McElhany and his fellow reviewers mentioned the lack of EDT peer review in a November 2005 peer review of a pilot project on instream flows posted on the Shared Strategy's website. McElhany, along with University of Washington research professor Derek Booth, and consultant Bill Trush, said EDT "has many innovative attributes but also many questionable assumptions, of which almost none have been subjected to careful, unbiased scrutiny. Until that has occurred, it will be easy (and appropriate) to cast doubt on any management actions that have been guided by EDT results."
They said the report on instream flows made a "noble effort" to apply EDT to the two watersheds, but it really showed "that this approach should not be used as the template for region-wide planning."
EDT developers Lars Mobrand and several of his staffers responded with a vigorous defense of their model. They said the charge that EDT did not "pass even the lowest standards for a scientifically-reviewed framework" was "...nonsense. We submit that EDT is the most documented, the most thoroughly reviewed and the most commonly understood tool used in salmon recovery in the Pacific Northwest." They said the results of EDT had been validated by "hundreds" of biologists throughout the Northwest. But in their final response, McElhany et al pointed to the quotation above, noting that the EDT supporters "did not cite a single review of the model," noting that "users" of a model cannot provide an independent peer review of it.
Furthermore, they said "Shared Strategy should be credited with conducting at least an application of EDT, even if not of the model itself; the present discussion serves (if nothing else) just how unusual such reviews have been." They strongly recommended against further applications of the EDT model until a peer review was completed, noting that the sensitivity analysis underway at NMFS, although useful, did not constitute a true peer review.
The consultants who developed EDT reported in August 2005 that several sensitivity analyses and validations of the tool were underway by NOAA Fisheries, WDFW, the Bureau of Reclamation and themselves, but did not respond by press time to enquiries about any results from these various exercises.
Puget Sound's final recovery plan doesn't mention the dustup over EDT, but in the NOAA Fisheries supplement to it, the feds said the Shared Strategy's plan was based on the "best, available science except for those specific issues where NMFS determines, through a critical assessment of all available scientific information, that alternative scientific conclusions are warranted." They weren't any more specific than that, but committed to work with local planning groups to improve implementation efforts.
The feds' own creation of parameters for viable salmon populations has had limited peer review itself, and such tools have been rarely used in recovery plans throughout the country. But the viability parameters (abundance, productivity, spatial structure and diversity) will be the yardsticks by which improvements to the listed chinook populations will be judged.
For the ESU as a whole to be delisted, the feds want two to four chinook populations in each of the Sound's five biological regions to achieve viability, and the viability of least one population from each major genetic and life history group historically present in each of the five regions.
They also call for Sound-wide tributaries not listed as primary habitat for any of the 22 chinook populations functioning enough to support an ESU-wide recovery scenario. The feds also want chinook production from these waters to occur in a "manner consistent with recovery," while populations that do not meet viability for all VSP parameters be sustained "to provide ecological functions and preserve options for ESU recovery."
The Sound's technical team said all 22 chinook populations in the Sound are currently at high risk, but not all have to achieve viability for the ESU to eventually reach a low-risk status, as long as they improve somewhat.
According to NMFS' own data, the sound's chinook population has ranged between 17,000 and 62,000 since the early 1980s, about evenly split between wild and hatchery fish. Other WDFW data from the late 1960s estimated Puget Sound wild chinook spawners at 32,000 back then (several thousand less than the 2003 return), with about twice as many fish returning to hatcheries. In those days, harvest rates were high, with Canadian sports and commercial fishermen estimated to catch more than 300,000 Puget Sound chinook a year, about twice the number caught by US sports, commercial and tribal fishers. -B. R.
[5] Seattle Mixes Salmon With New Art Park
Seattle's new $85-million sculpture park includes a $5.7-million seawall and salmon restoration project where it steps down to meet the city's waterfront. But the question remains whether it will have any benefits for fish.
That hasn't kept the salmon hype out of the media's lovefest at the opening of the park a few days ago. Local papers included colorful diagrams of the new shallow-water habitat created below the seawall, and touted its salmon-friendliness. But nobody mentioned that $1 million of the funding came from an "earmark" to last year's Interior Department budget, thanks to Washington senators Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell, and long-time representative Norm Dicks.
"It was a no-brainer to create a strong connection to Puget Sound," said Chris Rogers, head of capital projects for the art museum. He confirmed the earmark, and said over half the funding, about $3 million, came from the state Department of Transportation for fixing the seawall, about $500,000 came from the state's Aquatic Lands Enhancement Account, and $600,000 came from the City of Seattle.
The salmon fix for the 900-foot-long section of waterfront--which is about 10 percent of the barrier in the downtown waterfront area--included creation of a pocket beach and a shallow shelf 15 to 20 feet deep that serves to stabilize the seawall. The shelf was built by hauling in 50,000 tons of rock.
The state's Fish and Wildlife Department ponied up about $96,000 to fund "outreach and education" for the project. According to transcribed minutes from a July 2006 meeting of the Puget Sound Nearshore Partnership Executive Committee, WDFW director Jeff Koenings said "his interest in awarding funding is using the project as an education tool and monitoring for the adaptive management aspect to see if fish return."
There is a strong monitoring aspect to the project. A Wetlands Ecosystem Team from the University of Washington has already surveyed the area for fish, and plans to be back to see if juvenile salmon make use of the newly created shallow water habitat. Funding for this work came from the Green/Duwamish and Central Puget Sound Watershed Forum through a grant from the King Conservation District.
Back in 2002, the art museum applied for funding $500,000 of the restoration project's estimated $2.5 million cost through the state's Salmon Recovery Funding Board, but a technical review flagged the project as a "project of concern." Reviewers felt that something could be learned from the project, and they said it had "good visibility" and was a "good opportunity for public outreach."
But the reviewers called it a "very risky project," and hard to justify using SRFB criteria. They said it was worth pursuing, but not a good SRFB candidate. -B. R.
[6] Power Council Wades Into BC Coal Mine Controversy
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council agreed last week to send a letter to the British Columbia provincial government voicing its concern over the potential negative impacts to resources in Montana's Flathead Basin from a proposed coal mine just north of the U.S.-Canada border.
The Council is worried that the current process hasn't gathered enough information to determine these impacts. They said any assessment needs to include potential impacts south of the proposed mine site.
"While others may question the possibility of protecting the river from the negative impacts associated with a proposed mine in the headwaters, the Council finds that it is not possible to consider that question without additional information," the Jan. 18 letter stated.
The letter said water quality changes from the mining operations could threaten Montana's bull trout and westslope cutthroat trout.
Montana Council member Bruce Measure said the Cline mine proposal was the newest in a number of "mountaintop removal" mine proposals by BC's ministry of the environment. He said Montana and other entities have asked the ministry "to open up commentary on what should be included in their environmental assessment by the company to folks south of the border."
In British Columbia, Measure said, the process is to license mining facilities to individual companies, who are then free to begin mining after they have gone through an environmental review done by the company itself.
Measure said the previous federal and provincial governments had held up proposals, but the change in Canada's federal government has presented mine supporters an opportunity to move the project forward.
The Cline mine is projected to produce 2 million tons of coal a year for 20 years. Montana Council staffer Kerry Berg said his state's representative for the fish, wildlife and parks department has already testified that if the proposal went through, there would be impacts to fish and wildlife in the Flathead Basin. -B. R.
[7] Zebra Mussels Found In California's Lake Mead
A colony of dreaded zebra mussels, or one of its cousins, was spotted in early January in California's Lake Mead, the huge reservoir created by Hoover Dam. The mussels have created havoc in the Great Lakes and elsewhere, decimating natural ecosystems, and proliferating in cooling system pipes in everything from nuclear power plants to Mississippi River towboats.
Until now, the tiny mussels, pretty much the number one critter on the invasive species list, have kept east of the Continental Divide, though some live ones had been intercepted on boats that were trailered west. A program called "The 100th Meridian Initiative" has been developed by resource agencies in a coordinated effort to keep them from reaching the West Coast.
The latest discovery at a marina near Las Vegas has California and Arizona agency officials stunned. Marina personnel monitor nearby waters monthly for any sign of zebra mussels. They've had several close calls. In 2004, a park service employee spotted mussels on a boat about to be put into the lake.
In ideal conditions, up to 800,000 mussels per square meter have been observed where plankton levels are high. That could limit mussel productivity in places like the Columbia River, but the news of the Lake Mead find still had Basin biologists nervous.
The news was discussed at the January meeting of mid-level policymakers for the Columbia River hydro system. "Though they're not here yet, it's only a matter of time," said Jim Ruff, hydro analyst for the Northwest Power and Conservation Council. Biologists think the mussels could grow in the intake pipes of fish passage systems at federal dams. Steps to end a potential mussel infestation at mainstem Columbia River dams could cost $20 million or more, according to a 2005 BPA study
Last September, some Columbia Basin biologists released a working draft of a rapid response plan to be ready for any future infestation. According to information in the plan, more than 100 cases were reported between 2004 and 2006 of mussels intercepted on trailered boats in western states. -B. R.
[8] Idaho Governor Appoints New NPCC Member
Incoming Idaho Gov. Butch Otter has replaced Judi Danielson, one of the state's representatives to the Northwest Power and Conservation Council, with Bill Booth, a member of the governor's transition team.
Danielson, a Council member since 2001, was targeted for removal by conservation groups after she wrote an editorial in the Idaho Statesman in favor of keeping lower Snake dams in place. She chaired the council in 2003 and 2004.
Booth, a former vice president of environmental planning for Hecla Mining and a member of Trout Unlimited, took over at the mid-month Council meeting in Vancouver, Wash. He is the second member of Otter's transition team to be appointed to a high-level statewide position.
Idaho's other council member, Jim Kempton, will remain in his present position. -B. R.
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