[2] BPA Customers Raise Big Questions Over New F&W Agreements
BPA customer groups are calling for their own memorandum of agreement with Bonneville and other action agencies that spells out how the agreements reached earlier this month with Columbia Basin tribes and states are supposed to fit into the region's current fish and wildlife program.
The proposed MOAs will trade hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of new habitat and hatchery projects for tribal and state support of the next hydro BiOp. However, the added expenses are expected to boost the annual cost of the direct fish and wildlife program by more than 60 percent. With new BiOp costs figured in, the total comes to about $250 million a year.
Add the expense of hydro operations for fish--another $600 million annually, on average--and BPA is on the hook to shell out close to $900 million a year for fish and wildlife costs for the next 10 years. That's on top of the $9 billion it has already spent on salmon-recovery efforts in the Columbia Basin.
In comments sent to the power-marketing agency, Terry Flores, Northwest River Partners' executive director, said the MOAs leave too many important issues "unresolved."
Since the customer groups were not privy to the negotiations that created the MOAs, they are requesting "that BPA negotiate an MOA with RiverPartners to identify how our key interest will be preserved and identifying opportunities to participate in future decision-making."
The Public Power Council, Pacific Northwest Generating Cooperative and Northwest Requirements Utilities supported the request.
"We are feeling somewhat disenfranchised," said NRP's Flores, who noted that the MOAs' costs will likely boost wholesale-power rates about 4 percent during the 10-year life of the agreements. That's at the high end of the range BPA had estimated a couple of weeks ago when the proposed agreements were announced.
Since the customers were completely shut out of the talks with tribes and the action agencies, their feelings are hurt. Privately, some said they don't expect much of a response, because the MOAs were finished off in such haste (to beat the new BiOp's slated release) that there really aren't many answers yet to questions of costs and benefits.
Flores' group wants to make sure that the fish-recovery efforts stay on top of the latest research, and is calling for an annual science symposium to incorporate the newest fish findings into implementation of the MOAs, to help "ensure accountability and transparency for interests involved in the region, especially those who are paying the costs."
RiverPartners also asked for more details of how the Northwest Power and Conservation Council and the independent science review panel that reviews proposals for BPA's F&W program fit into the picture.
The tribal MOAs don't call for independent review of each proposal, but are asking the ISRP to take a broader look at the new agreements, to make sure they mesh with sub-basin plans.
Flores said it isn't clear whether the projects outlined in the MOAs fully satisfy regional obligations, or if more will be needed as the council moves through its process to amend the F&W program.
The council's F&W committee is meeting April 30 in Spokane to discuss how to get a handle on the project review process. The MOAs have produced about another 200 or so projects, in addition to the 73 actions (with many sub-components) that are part of the new BiOp.
The customer groups raised another important issue--Are the MOAs really worthwhile?
That was asked because BPA is still obligated to pay for the tribes' support even if BiOp Judge James Redden orders additional expensive operations or other fish obligations.
The MOAs do include some vague language about how all parties may dissolve the agreement if "material" changes occur to either hydro operations or future harvests, but the customers want more clarification on this topic.
An April 23 analysis (based on "best, professional judgment") by the three tribes estimated productivity benefits from the hatchery actions. For Yakima River steelhead, they pegged an improvement (in 25 years) in egg-to-smolt productivity of 17 percent from all the habitat actions in the MOA. For Tucannon River chinook, the increase in productivity was estimated at 5 percent. For Upper Columbia spring chinook (Entiat River)--26 percent.
Expected fish numbers were not included in the analysis, but most affected stocks contain modest numbers at present. It seems likely that the 10-year benefit from the MOA would only add up to 5,000 to 10,000 more adult fish at best. Any significant increase in fish numbers would probably come from the hatchery actions included in the MOA.
The Yakama, Warm Springs and Umatilla tribes have also agreed to quit advocating for breaching lower Snake River dams during the 10-year MOAs. Only poor fish returns might allow for them to consider breaching after 2017.
The tribe most affected by the potential breaching--the Nez Perce in Idaho--has not yet signed on, which reserves its right to keep up the call for removing the dams.
But sources familiar with the situation say that Nez Perce tribal officials were supportive of signing the MOA, although they were conflicted by advice from their counsel, who has pushed for another round of litigation. By May 5, when the new BiOp was released, the tribe had not approved the MOA.
Other comments to BPA pointed out potential legal problems with the change of heart by the three tribes. Oregon Gov. Ted Kulongoski said he was "especially concerned that the agreements may require the tribes to amend or recant scientific evidence and testimony previously offered in administrative proceedings, legal briefings and hearings under NWF v. NMFS. To the extent that any such retractions are without scientific basis or contradict scientific evidence supported by Oregon, I will support appointment of an independent science panel to review said retractions in the light of the best available science."
Gov. Kulongoski, the only Northwest governor who does not support the MOAs, indicated in his comments that Oregon will challenge the new BiOp in court unless it includes a revised analysis and actions that satisfy Oregon's concerns (That didn't happen).
Oregon wants more spill at dams and a drawdown of John Day reservoir that it claims will improve juvenile fish survival. Evidently, the three-tribe MOA language about John Day isn't good enough for him, nor is the promise to keep summer spill at dams longer than the draft BiOp spells out.
The MOA calls for action agencies to meet with the tribes "in the near-term to discuss relevant existing hydraulic and biological information to better understand the biological benefits and/or detriments associated with John Day reservoir operations." It also notes that an action to draw down the reservoir to minimum operating pool "is a contingency and so may be decided as a product of the 2015 comprehensive review."
The drawdown language in the MOA did take some hits from other parties.
The Inland Ports and Navigation Group supported the MOAs for adding more certainty to funding BiOp-related actions and was pleased that the discussion over John Day operations would include potential benefits and detriments--which could curtail the $3 billion in annual barge traffic unless significant dredging of the navigation channel and lock entrances took place.
Environmental groups, including American Rivers and the NW Energy Coalition, generally supported the tribal projects, but took issue with several proposals in the agreements with Idaho and Montana. They voiced strong objections to boosting spending by $20 million to expand hatchery programs for ESA-listed Redfish Lake sockeye, until dam operations are changed and they are "reconfigured"--an Orwellian term for breaching.
The environmental groups also complained about the flow changes in the mainstem Columbia that will be brought about by operating Montana reservoirs to improve resident fish populations.
The groups also said the agreements with the states will prevent state scientists from offering independent review of salmon-recovery issues without going through their governors' offices.
The Montana MOA took a surprise hit from the Kootenai/Salish tribes, who are usually major players in F&W policy talks between the state and BPA. They said the agreement between BPA and the state is shoddy, misleading and incoherent, and violates a previous MOA between BPA, the state of Montana and the tribes. The tribes criticized the agreement, saying it was "driven overwhelmingly by ESA concerns," and wasn't adequate to address resident fish impacts over the next 10 years.
Wild fish advocates Native Fish Society and Wild Fish Conservancy didn't like the large proposed investment in artificial production. They said such large-scale projects aren't consistent with the NPCC's F&W program and ESA recovery efforts.
Without "substantive review" by the ISRP, they were afraid NOAA Fisheries would rubber-stamp these new projects for approval.
"This language commits the Tribes and BPA only to soliciting the ISRP for their views," says the WFC, "and then going ahead with their plans as previously proposed as the language retains complete latitude for the Tribes and BPA to proceed with new hatchery projects as they so desire." -B. R.
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