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With the passage of legislation that allows for the lethal removal of more sea lions in the Columbia River, states and tribes asked for funding to buy much larger equipment that will be used to remove steller sea lions at Bonneville Dam.

Two Northwest Power and Conservation Council members, one the longest serving member since the Council’s inception in 1981, officially retired at the end of December 2018.

Legislation that will allow the lethal removal of more California sea lions, as well as steller sea lions, from the Columbia River passed two hurdles in the past week and now is headed to the President’s desk for signature.

Predation on listed salmon and steelhead in the Columbia River basin – by birds, by sea lions and even by other fish – has reached high proportions but it is difficult to know how reductions in predators impact the number of fish returning to spawning grounds.

Anglers in Lake Roosevelt caught a 47.5 inch, 27.5 pound northern pike in the lake and another angler caught a pike just 10 miles from the rim of Grand Coulee Dam, much further downstream than previous sightings of the predatory fish.

As the Northwest Power and Conservation Council seeks new candidates for two scientific review panels, it is also looking to cut the annual budgets for both the Independent Scientific Review Panel and Independent Scientific Advisory Board.

A draft report by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council that will be sent to Congress early next year says that changes in the energy markets as the U.S. and the West Coast transition away from coal, competition from other utilities, along with a massive build-up of solar power in California causing lower energy sales to the state is leaving the Bonneville Power Administration less competitive than in past years.

A long-range plan by tribes to restore Pacific lamprey runs into the Columbia River received approval last week from the Northwest Power and Conservation Council at its meeting in Portland.

The cost to remove invasive northern pike in Lake Roosevelt will likely rise to more than $1 million per year beginning next fiscal year and much of that will be funded by the Bonneville Power Administration.

A report produced by Columbia River tribes on what is known about Pacific lamprey in the Columbia River basin was positively received by an independent body of scientists last month.

The Pacific Northwest’s economy is growing, overall employment levels are now exceeding levels from before the 2008 recession, and the region continues to produce more goods and services using less electricity according to a staff presentation at the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s Power Committee meeting in Portland on December 12.

A one-year court-ordered plan that describes how to spill to a total dissolved gas cap level at each of the four lower Snake River and four lower Columbia River dams this coming spring was delivered to U.S. District Court of Oregon Friday, Dec. 8.

A recent CBB article (https://www.www.www.columbiabasinbulletin.org/439508.aspx) wrote of a Northwest Power and Conservation Council meeting in which fish managers said that the primary cause of this year’s 40-year low in some salmon and steelhead returns, especially in the Snake River Basin, was ocean conditions - specifically, “a Blob” of hot water offshore.

The Pacific Northwest's power supply is expected to be adequate through 2020, although the region will need to add new capacity by 2021 to maintain an adequate supply, according to the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.

The sea lion population at Bonneville Dam has climbed above the 10-year average and so has the number of salmon and steelhead the animals are preying on, according to the most recent pinniped status report released by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, May 18.

Tim Baker this month replaced Pat Smith as one of Montana’s members on the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.

The Northwest Power And Conservation Council is inviting comments on a draft revision of the its “Research Plan” for the Columbia River Basin Fish and Wildlife Program.

More than 225,000 Northern Pikeminnow were caught this year as part of a program that rewards anglers for each predatory fish they catch.

Sea lions have been seen at Bonneville Dam as recently as this week, long after the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers stopped its annual tracking of the predators at the dam at the end of May.

The Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week named Ben Kujala Director of Power Planning. Kujala has been acting director since April. He replaces Tom Eckman, who retired in July.

The Northwest Power and Conservation Council reluctantly approved using Budget Oversight Group (known as BOG) emergency funding for the Bonneville Power Administration’s Northern Pikeminnow Sport Reward program, which is already over budget this year with one month remaining in its season.

According to the Northwest Power and Conservation Council's assessment of the Pacific Northwest's power supply, the region should have an adequate supply through 2020, although the planned retirements of four coal plants by 2022 means that the region will have to acquire nearly 1,400 megawatts of new capacity to lower the chance of a shortfall.

Supplemental funding for a northern pike suppression project managed by the Spokane Tribe of Indians was approved by the Northwest Power and Conservation Council at its February meeting, but on the condition that the Independent Scientific Review Panel review the Tribe’s latest proposal.

The Northwest Power and Conservation Council this week tapped Oregon member Henry Lorenzen as its chairman for the next year and Idaho’s Bill Booth as vice-chair.