Gov. Gary Locke on Monday launched a "sweeping new Columbia River Regional Initiative" he says is aimed at improving Columbia and Snake river water management for the benefit of fish and humans.
The Northwest Power Planning Council is pondering a "freeze" on funding
for new fish and wildlife projects until it can judge the full weight of
growing demands stemming from its newly instituted provincial review
process and from federal hydrosystem biological opinions.
The Bonneville Power Administration officially ended Oct. 3 a power
emergency that had been in effect since April 3.
The emergency was declared by BPA administrator Steve Wright when the
agency realized that a combination West Coast power shortage, high
wholesale electricity prices and a drought that had depleted water
supplies caused the reliability of the region's electricity system to be
in peril.
The Northwest Power Planning Council Thursday adopted a fiscal year 2002
fish and wildlife program "provisional start of year" budget that sets a
wavy line at $152.7 million.
The Senate has approved an additional $4 million for Pacific salmon
restoration projects in Washington state, raising total funding next
year to $74 million for four West Coast states.
The Pacific Salmon Fund is part of the $42 billion FY02 appropriation
bill for the Department of Commerce and other departments. The Senate
total is $26 million less than the House approved in July but $18
million above the current fiscal year.
Boosted by a huge "tule" return, the 2001Columbia River upriver fall
chinook run has tracked at a record pace, with more adults passing
Bonneville Dam this year than in any year since the project was built in
1938.
The threatened Snake River portion of the upriver run is also producing
some surprising numbers.
U.S. Secretary of Commerce Don Evans on Thursday announced the
appointment of Dr. William T. Hogarth to head the department's National
Marine Fisheries Service and Robert Lohn as chief of NMFS' Northwest
region.
Hogarth, a veteran with 16 years of experience in fisheries and natural
resources management, has since January been NMFS acting assistant
administrator.
Columbia Basin fish and wildlife managers have been asked to more
precisely outline their project priorities midway through a new process
that has identified fish and wildlife project needs likely to surpass
the projected budget ceiling for fiscal year 2002 and beyond.
At the request of the Federal Caucus (federal dam operators, regulators
and fish and wildlife agencies), the multi-agency Implementation Team
(IT) is reviewing what it may have learned this spring and summer from
operating the Federal Columbia River Power System under a system power
emergency.
Fisheries biologists have counted 13 adult sockeye that have made it all
the way back into the Stanley Basin, with three more holding below the
Sawtooth weir, for a total of 16 so far, according to the Idaho Fish and
Game Department.
Substantial concurrence between fish and wildlife managers and a
scientific panel on fish and wildlife project proposals in the "Columbia
Plateau" province figures to complicate decisions as the Northwest Power
Planning Council and Bonneville Power Administration launch into a new
post "MOA" era.
Citing better than expected stream flows, but an uncertain financial
position, the Bonneville Power Administration proposed this week to
increase spill at two federal dams.
As a result of the proposal, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers increased
spill Wednesday at The Dalles Dam to 40 percent of river flow for 24
hours and to 24-hour spill of 50,000 cubic feet per second at Bonneville
Dam beginning Thursday evening.
Two unlikely partners announced they will team up to attempt a takeover
of two mid-Columbia dams when the dams' license expires in 2005.
The Yakama Nation and PacifiCorp, a division of Scottish Power, will
compete in the licensing process to secure Grant County Public Utility
District's Wanapum and Priest Rapids dams.
The agency caught in the middle -- the Bonneville Power Administration
-- fielded questions Wednesday about how it might mete out "off-site
mitigation" fish and wildlife recovery funding as the lines blur between
federal Endangered Species Act mandates and those under the Northwest
Power Act.
Three federal hydroelectric operating agencies released for public
comment their long-anticipated plan on how they will operate the hydro
system and what they will do in the other "H's" -- hatcheries, harvest
and habitat -- to aid salmon recovery.
The Columbia Basin's fish and wildlife managers have recommended that at
least $55 million, and as much as $81 million, be spent next year on
projects in the vast region now described as the Columbia Plateau
province.
Columbia Basin state and tribal representatives gathered Wednesday to
discuss how they fit into salmon recovery plans that profess federal
responsibility but stress that success hinges in part on actions taken
outside federal agencies' direct authorities.
A self-described "five-year blueprint for fish recovery actions by the
three (action) agencies" was released this week in draft form --
detailing how Federal Columbia River Power System operators aim to meet
survival goals for salmon, steelhead and resident fish species listed
under the Endangered Species Act.
The Bonneville Power Administration this week agreed to begin a limited
summer spill program at two lower Columbia River dams to help juvenile
salmon remaining in the river pass federal projects.
At the multi-agency Implementation Team meeting this week, BPA said it
can spill 30 percent of the river at The Dalles Dam for up to two weeks
and about 45,000 cubic feet per second for 5 hours per day at Bonneville
Dam, depending on actual river flow.
A 2001 trend towards early and abundant fish runs is continuing, with
upriver summer steelhead adult counts seemingly on a record pace.
The single highest daily steelhead count on record -- 10,181 -- was
charted Monday (July 23) at the Columbia River's Bonneville Dam ...
The number of endangered sockeye salmon swimming toward central Idaho's
Stanley Basin is a trickle compared to the relative gusher of adults
that made the trip up the Columbia, Snake and Salmon rivers last year.
But researchers involved in the captive broodstock program -- attempting
to revive a population that counted zero returning adults in 1997 and
one in 1998 -- remain optimistic.
A "first-cut" review of proposed fiscal 2002 hydrosystem fish passage
and research projects Wednesday served to shoehorn $100 million in
originally estimated needs into what is expected to be about an $80
million Columbia River Fish Mitigation Project budget.
The Columbia Basin's four governors received assurances last week that
the Bush administration is committed to implementing federal salmon
recovery strategies completed last year, and that it will do it
hand-in-hand with the states.
The Senate on Thursday passed a spending bill that would authorize $2
billion in new borrowing by the Bonneville Power Administration.
The energy and water development appropriation bill for fiscal 2002 also
provides funds for ecosystem restoration, riparian protection, and fish mitigation on the Columbia River.
The Bonneville Power Administration announced Thursday that it will fund
approximately $10 million worth of projects aimed at helping fish
affected by this year's power emergency operations at federal
hydroelectric projects in the Columbia Basin.
An Earthwise Knowledge Initiative Publication
