The Bonneville Power Administration this week reports that its “strong 2021 financial performance” has carried into the first quarter of 2022. BPA’s current net revenue forecast is $456 million compared to a rate case net revenue forecast of $178 million.
Whether the lower Snake River dams should be breached to revive flagging wild salmon and steelhead runs is certainly a top regional issue. And what the impacts would be to the Northwest power supply is a key factor in the breach/no breach debate.
An annual salmon survival study by the Fish Passage Center says increasing smolt-to-adult returns to recovery levels for Snake River salmon and steelhead will require breaching the Lower Snake River dams and increasing spill at lower Columbia River dams.
The Confederated Tribes of the Warm Springs celebrated the New Year by exercising its option to purchase a larger share of the Pelton Round Butte hydroelectric project on the Deschutes River in central Oregon.
The U.S. Department of Energy announced $25 million in funding to support increased research, development, and demonstration of technologies that harness wave power to create electricity. The funding supports eight projects that will make up the first round of open-water testing at the PacWave South test site off the Oregon coast.
In a “System Operational Request,” Columbia River basin fishery managers this week asked the Bonneville Power Administration for more clarity on its implementation of zero generation/nighttime flow at lower Snake River dams. The answer drew concerns about how future SORs might be received.
Idaho Power, PacifiCorp and the Bonneville Power Administration have reached a non-binding agreement that they say would “help meet growing customer demand, improve safety and reliability, and reinforce the Pacific Northwest transmission system.”
In 2020, carbon dioxide emissions from Pacific Northwest power plants that burn coal and natural gas totaled 45.64 million metric tons, the lowest in at least 25 years and a roughly 20-percent decline from emissions in 2019 (2020 is the latest year for which emissions data is available). The data reflects emissions from electricity generation at power plants and does not account for ‘upstream’ emissions from, for example, coal mining and gas production.
At its January meeting, the Northwest Power and Conservation Council elected Guy Norman, a Washington member, Chair and Doug Grob, a Montana member, vice chair for 2022.
One week after Washington Gov. Jay Inslee released a package of salmon recovery strategies that includes proposed funding for a study of the impacts of removing the four Lower Snake dams, Northwest RiverPartners released the results of commissioned poll showing nearly 60 percent of respondents opposed dam breaching.
The Bureau of Reclamation and the Bonneville Power Administration announced this week the completion of the major overhaul of three hydroelectric power units at Grand Coulee Dam, the largest power generating complex in the United States.
A federal court approved this month details on the “how” of fish passage, drawdowns and spill designed to aid salmon and steelhead passage at Willamette River dams, even as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is preparing a new environmental impact statement for the agency’s 13 Willamette Valley Project dams.
More than one-third of the public comments on its draft Power Plan received by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council had to do with whether it got it right on the four lower Snake River dams.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee this week said he is seeking $187 million during the 2022 legislative session for salmon recovery strategies, including funds for studying the impacts of breaching the four Lower Snake River dams.
Where are we today, closing days of the year, with management of Columbia River Basin salmon recovery?
A Northwest conservation group is suing the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for operating the agency’s lower Columbia River dams without U.S. Environmental Protection Agency pollutant permits.
The United States and Canada will hold the eleventh round of negotiations to modernize the Columbia River Treaty on December 9. The negotiators will meet virtually to advance talks about key issues such as flood risk management, hydroelectric power generation and ecosystems.
The Bonneville Power Administration has closed the books on fiscal year 2021 with an annual report showing the agency exceeded its target net revenue number by $360 million.
Upper Columbia River tribes laid out plans this week that will cost the region about $176 million to reintroduce salmon and steelhead upstream of federal dams. The dams have been blocking access to the fish since Grand Coulee Dam was built in 1942.
More than 94 percent of migrating juvenile yearling chinook salmon pass upper-Columbia River publicly-owned dams safely, according to two studies by two of the dams’ owners.
The most abundant anadromous fish in the Columbia River basin is not salmon, nor is it steelhead. It is non-native shad, which outnumbers the basin’s iconic species in the river by millions of fish.
Former Oregon state legislator Ginny Burdick joined the Northwest Power and Conservation Council this month, replacing Richard Devlin.
Following up on its intentions announced in June, the Washington State Pollution Control Hearings Board last week rejected the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers challenge to state water quality rules for temperature and other pollutants for Columbia/Snake River dams and reservoirs. The rules are aimed at protecting salmon and steelhead.
Coho salmon are returning to Oregon’s Clackamas River in numbers not seen since 1958 when Portland General Electric’s North Fork Dam was built on the river. With 9,370 early- and late-run fish this year, coho return numbers are far outpacing last year’s run, which tallied just 3,782 of the fish.
U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) last week offered information about “the historic investment to support salmon restoration and resiliency included in the draft reconciliation bill text” released by the House of Representatives.
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