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THE ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, DECEMBER 26, 2019
Jesse Tinsley/The Spokesman-Review
The Chief Joseph Dam on the Columbia River in eastern Washington.
Columbia River dam energy storage project brings jobs
Native tribes concerned
By COURTNEY FLATT
Northwest News Network
A new energy storage project is in the
works near eastern Washington’s Chief
Joseph Dam on the Columbia River. The
project is expected to bring construction jobs
to the region. But the nearby Confederated
Tribes of the Colville Reservation worry it
would harm important cultural areas.
The Pearl Hill battery project would work
like this: When there’s extra energy on the
grid, it would pump water stored behind the
dam in the Columbia River — known as
Rufus Woods Lake — to a smaller reservoir
up high. Then, when more energy is needed
(like when people come home from work), it
could generate power by releasing that stored
water through a hydro turbine back into the
lake.
Project backers are still applying for
licensing with the Federal Energy Regula-
tory Commission. A commission spokesper-
son said there is not yet a timeline for when
a fi nal decision on the license will be issued.
The Pearl Hill site is by far the smallest
project in the Northwest, compared to sim-
ilar facilities in the works. It would be able
to produce up to fi ve megawatts at a time
during peak capacity, or roughly the amount
of power that by two wind turbines can
generate.
But its builders – Shell Energy North
America – say the project is important to
help make the power grid more reliable.
These types of projects are expected to back
up other renewable sources when the wind
isn’t blowing and the sun isn’t shining.
According to the fi nal environmental
assessment for the Pearl Hill hydropower
license, “Issuing a license for the Pearl Hill
Project would allow Shell to generate elec-
tricity at the project for the term of the new
license, making electric power from a renew-
able resource available to the regional grid.”
In documents fi led to the Federal Energy
Regulatory Commission, the Confederated
Tribes of the Colville Reservation don’t sup-
port the project. The Colville Tribes say the
project will harm cultural artifacts and plants
used as traditional food and medicines.
“It’s just getting harder and harder for
our people to fi nd a lot of these resources for
ceremonial purposes, let alone as a healthy
nutritious food to sustain our people,” said
Colville Business Council Chairman Rod-
ney Cawston. “The archeological resources
are very signifi cant to us. Once those are
destroyed, you can never bring them back
again. Those places were used by our ances-
tors in many different ways. The things that
were left behind today are very critical to us.”
In the documents, the Colville Tribes
questioned whether such a small project is
worth the cultural harm it could cause. They
also worried it would take more energy to
pump water up the hill to be stored than the
project would ultimately generate.
Offi cials at Shell Energy North America
were unavailable for an interview for this
story.
The largest proposed pumped storage
facility in the Northwest would be built out-
side Goldendale, Washington. Compared
to the Pearl Hill project, the Goldendale
pumped storage project could generate 1,200
megawatts.
A large storage project near Klamath Falls
recently received federal approval, mak-
ing it the fi rst pumped storage project to be
licensed in the Northwest since a project at
Grand Coulee Dam in 1973. Residents there
told Oregon Public Broadcasting they were
concerned about hits to their property val-
ues. The Klamath Tribes also raised concerns
about that project’s upper reservoir being
built on a culturally important site.
Pumped storage projects are on the rise
in the Pacifi c Northwest – with nine planned
facilities on the books for Washington, Ore-
gon, Idaho and Montana, according to a
December presentation given to the North-
west Power and Conservation Council.
In a blog post, council staff said power
generated from pumped hydropower can be
adjusted to compliment renewable energy,
which “is a critical need as more renewable
generation is added to the power grid.”
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