Forecasts for Columbia River basin water supply at the basin’s major storage dams dropped again this month after much of the region experienced the driest spring on record (March through May).
British Columbia’s Columbia River Treaty Team recently issued a preliminary assessment of the feasibility of building a new dam/weir across the Koocanusa Reservoir to maintain higher water levels on the Canadian side of the border, concluding that increased coordination with the United States is a better option for now. The reservoir is created by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Libby Dam in Montana.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Portland District has finalized a Finding of No Significant Impact for the Environmental Assessment of the reservoir pool reduction at Willamette Valley’s Detroit Dam in response to a seismic hazard analysis last year.
March and April of 2021 in Oregon were among the driest spring months since the 1890s. Many streams are already at 25 percent of the flow that is typical for this time of year, with flows usually seen in early summer observed in April on some southern Oregon streams.
In an effort to return numbers of bull trout to self-sustainable levels, Yakama Nation Fisheries and their partners last week released 531 bull trout into Kachess Reservoir and 61 bull trout into Gold Creek, a tributary to Keechelus Reservoir.
Monthly estimates of available water supply in the Columbia River basin are continuing to drop after a month of record low rainfall in April.
A lower than average May water supply forecast at Montana’s Libby Dam has reduced the amount of flow augmentation available to encourage spawning of endangered Kootenai River white sturgeon downstream in Idaho.
Communities, industries, farms and endangered fish in both Washington and Oregon depend on the Walla Walla River Basin where streamflows and aquifers have steadily declined, despite a decades-long effort to find lasting water solutions in the region.
If the Bonneville Power Administration’s fish and wildlife budget is to remain flat – no increases through 2028 – that could impact an important maintenance program that keeps juvenile salmon and steelhead from being stranded in irrigation ditches, according to Idaho and Washington fish screen managers.
The California Department of Fish and Wildlife is trucking millions of hatchery-raised juvenile Central Valley fall-run chinook salmon this spring to San Pablo Bay, San Francisco Bay and seaside net pens due to projected poor river conditions in the Central Valley. The massive trucking operation is designed to ensure the highest level of survival for the young salmon on their hazardous journey to the Pacific Ocean.
With juvenile chinook and sockeye salmon, as well as juvenile steelhead, beginning their migration from the mid-Columbia River tributaries and hatcheries, but with very low water in the river due to a late spring runoff, salmon managers this week asked for augmentation flows originating from Grand Coulee Dam’s Lake Roosevelt.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Portland District is anticipating an insufficient water year as it refills its 13 Willamette Valley and two Rogue River Basin reservoirs for the upcoming recreation season.
After a week of increasing outflows at Idaho’s Dworshak Dam to support releases of juvenile salmon from Clearwater River hatcheries, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers announced last Friday (April 16) that it will now begin to decrease those flows so that it can be assured of refilling the dam’s reservoir.
As of April 3 the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began a controversial operation that raises the Lower Granite Dam reservoir elevation to ensure that it can maintain a 14-foot depth in the federal navigation channel at the Port of Clarkstonwhen Snake River flows are low.
Juvenile salmon run the gamut of predators – birds, other fish and pinnipeds – as they migrate from their rearing grounds far upstream in the Columbia River basin all the way to the ocean, but they also are confronted with predators as they enter the ocean.
The water supply available to Columbia and Snake river basin rivers from spring and early summer runoff is predicted to be near to below average across the region. While lower Columbia and Snake River water supply is predicted to be below average, further upriver in Idaho and Montana water supply predictions are above average.
In August, fishery managers at the multi-agency Technical Management Team rejected a bid by the Port of Clarkston on the lower Snake River in Idaho to raise the Lower Granite Dam reservoir one and a half feet above the normal minimum operating pool (MOP+2) to provide more depth for barges loading grain at the port’s dock.
Even with a suddenly higher March 1 water supply forecast, operators at Dworshak Dam say they will be able maintain river flows and total dissolved gas levels below Idaho clean water standards so that Clearwater River hatcheries can safely release smolts.
As the planet warms, scientists expect that mountain snowpack should melt progressively earlier in the year. However, observations in the U.S. show that as temperatures have risen, snowpack melt is relatively unaffected in some regions while others can experience snowpack melt a month earlier in the year.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Portland and Walla Walla districts will close all Corps navigation locks on the Columbia and Snake rivers March 6 at 6 a.m. for regularly-scheduled annual inspections, preventative maintenance and repairs.
The Washington Department of Ecology is seeking comment on what should be considered when preparing an environmental impact statement for a new hydropower project proposed along the Columbia River in Klickitat County.
The states of Oregon and Washington, the Nez Perce Tribe, the Bonneville Power Administration and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers told the Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week that flexible spill in 2020 met all of a flexible spill agreement’s goals in its second year. All were signatories to the 2018 flexible spill agreement.
In its second year, which was an average flow year, the higher flexible spill operations yielded faster travel time for juvenile salmon and steelhead, fewer collisions by juveniles with turbines and better overall survival through Snake River dams, all while the Bonneville Power Administration actually made some money.
Every year about this time, NOAA Fisheries releases a memo detailing preliminary survival estimates for passage of spring-migrating juvenile salmonids through Snake and Columbia River dams – key data for assessing the impact of federal hydropower operations on 13 species of salmon and steelhead listed under the Endangered Species Act. This year, however, due to Covid-19 impacts and more spill for fish, that data took a hit.
A new type of soil created by engineers at The University of Texas at Austin can pull water from the air and distribute it to plants, potentially expanding the map of farmable land around the globe to previously inhospitable places and reducing water use in agriculture at a time of growing droughts.
An Earthwise Knowledge Initiative Publication
