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NEWS/FEATURES WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2020 HERMISTONHERALD.COM • A13 Oregon looks upstream to the lower Snake River By JESSICA POLLARD STAFF WRITER Last week Oregon Gov. Kate Brown temporarily shifted the political debate from cap and trade during the legislative session to the waters of the Columbia Riv- er’s largest tributary — the Snake River — and the four lower dams on the Eastern Washington portion of it. Brown on Feb. 11 wrote a letter to Washington Gov. Jay Inslee expressing her support to remove the earthen portions from the four concrete lower Snake River dams. She stated the science was clear — removal is the most probable answer to salmon and steelhead population recovery in the Columbia River Basin, which could aid orcas in their forage for fatty spring Chinook salmon off the mouth of the Colum- bia in late winter each year. However, she added, “much must be done before this is accomplished in order to help minimize and mitigate for potential harm to other vital sectors.” The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in the mid-1970s built the Lower Gran- ite Dam, the Little Goose Dam, the Lower Monu- mental Dam and the Ice Harbor Dam east of Pasco where water discharges into the Columbia. The dams supply water to irri- gate farmland, hydropower and transportation routes. The Nez Perce, Yakama, Umatilla, Warm Springs, and Shoshone Bannock tribes all relied on fi sh- ing from the river, which was once a main contribu- tor and contained millions of salmon each year, well before the construction of the dams. Tribal salmon now are harvested per treaty rights at less than 1% of the lev- els they were before tribes made contact with white settlers, according to a report issued by the Colum- bia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission in 2014. “Our diet still con- sists highly on salmon. It’s important we’re able to consume those foods,” said Chuck Sams, com- munications director for the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reser- vation. “We agree with a number of science reviews that there are issues around Staff photo by Ben Lonergan A grain pile and grain elevators operated by United Grain Corp. are seen on Friday afternoon. United Grain Corp. relies heavily on the river system for transport of grain to market. dams that could be resolved through fi sh passage and eventual dam removal.” Sams said the Confed- erated Umatilla Tribes will release a policy statement in coming weeks as the fi shing commission works to put its own new analysis of the lower Snake River together. Electric cooperatives, such as Umatilla Electric Cooperative in Hermiston, purchase the majority of their power from the Bon- neville Power Adminis- tration, the federal hydro- power agency. Ted Case, director of Oregon Rural Electric Cooperative Asso- ciation, said the 1,000 aver- age annual megawatts the lower Snake River dams produce can power a city the size of Seattle. He was shocked to hear Brown’s recent position in the lower Snake conversation. ‘We’ve had no consul- tation, there was no discus- sion about us,” he said. “It’s confounding.” He and representatives from other electric coopera- tives are worried about what dam removal would bring for rural Oregonians. “We’ll be short of power,” he said. “There’s a lot of concern as to how we’ll reach capacity. You could have blackouts in rural Oregon and electrical grid crashes.” A study in 2018 by Energy Strategies LLC for the Seattle-based North- west Energy Coalition begs to differ. CRYPTOQUIP The analysis quantifi ed the power from the lower Snake River dams and assessed the fi xed and vari- able costs of implementing renewable replacements, such as wind and solar, and what that would do to mar- ket prices. The lower dams provide nearly 4% of the Pacifi c Northwest’s electricity, according to the report, and at less than a 1% increase in emissions, a new energy portfolio relying on renew- ables and increased ener- gy-effi ciency would add a bit more than $1 a month to customer costs. But Energy GPS LLC refuted that last month in a study for Northwest River- Partners. It stated the lower Snake River dams generate up to 5.5% of the region’s electricity and replacing that power would cost $860 mil- lion a year. “The essence of it is this — the capabilities of these dams cannot be easily or inexpensively replaced. This would hurt those in Eastern Oregon who can least afford it,” Case stated in an email to the Hermiston Herald. Case also said he doesn’t think the federal approval needed to remove the dams would come anytime soon. “These dams would have to be removed by congres- sional action. It would cost billions of dollars,” he said. “We’re going to do every- thing we can to prevent that, but I see no broad support for such action.” For the Governor’s Offi ce, the letter to Inslee is simply an initiation of dis- cussion about the long-term future. In an email to the Herm- iston Herald, Kate Kon- dayen, press secretary for Brown, said the letter does not call for tearing the dams out, “as has been character- ized in initial coverage.” “Instead, Oregon is asserting that we see value in analyzing a future without the dams in the long term, but focusing any defi ni- tive next steps on working together to identify a viable path forward to that future with interim steps such as fl exible spill agreements,” she stated. Brown’s letter raised eyebrows for farmers and ports about what dam removal would mean for the transportation industry. The Pacifi c Northwest Water- ways Association asserts the Columbia Snake River System is the nation’s larg- est wheat export gateway, transporting more than half of all U.S. wheat to overseas markets. “Compromising, jeopar- dizing, eliminating any pro- ponent of the system jeop- ardizes the region on many levels,” said Port of Uma- tilla General Manager Kim Puzey. “The timing is not great.” Brown’s letter comes a few weeks before a draft of the Columbia River Sys- tems Operations Environ- mental Impact Statement is anticipated to be released in SUPER CROSSWORD: MULTIPLE LISTING conjunction with the Corps, the Bureau of Reclamation and Bonneville Power in response to a federal ruling calling for a major overhaul of Columbia Snake River dam operations in 2016. The Port of Umatilla has invested more than $100,000 in litigation regarding dam removal, and is home to one of Oregon’s largest wheat terminals along the Colum- bia Snake River System. United Grain Corp oper- ates the terminal and traf- fics hundreds of millions of bushels of wheat along the Snake River every year, including yields from Umatilla and Morrow counties. “As a grain company we depend on the river system heavily,” said Pacifi c North- west United Grain manager Jason Middleton.“Farmers enjoy a low basis number. (Removal) would have an immense impact.” Puzey and Middleton question the fuel effi ciency of relying more heavily on trains and trucks without the barge locks provided by the dams. “People who are con- cerned with a carbon foot- print and the airshed as it relates to transportation can’t possibly make a via- ble argument that the dams be removed,” Puzey said. According to the Water- ways Association, trans- portation via barge is the most fuel effi cient. A sin- gle barge on a river can carry as much cargo as 134 trucks can. “Removal would put many more trucks on the freeways and the highways. Infrastructure costs would go through the roof,” Mid- dleton said. But David Moryc, a senior director for Amer- ican Rivers, said contin- ued discussion could lead to cost-effective solutions, possibly through the for- mation of a shortline rail- road cooperative along the Snake River. “It’s really important we think strategically about infrastructure upgrades,” Moryc said. “How do we replace and improve the benefi ts that farmers want to see from their transpor- tation systems?” He asked how the bil- lions of dollars being poured into salmon res- toration along the river could be reinvested were dam removal to boost pop- ulations back to historical levels. “You’re talking about really high valued habitat where currently the salmon and steel stocks are hav- ing trouble because they have to pass through eight dams,” he said. American Rivers has helped negotiate river res- toration projects and pri- vate dam removals around the Pacifi c Northwest. “You’ve got a number of examples of signifi cant dam removal projects in history. We’re seeing pos- itive responses for salmon returns,” he said. Moryc said some util- ity entities have decided salmon restoration efforts and maintenance costs outweigh the price-tag from options outside hydropower. He doesn’t know how long it could take for dam removal to come to a head at a federal level, and added the environmental impact statement coming later this month likely won’t advo- cate for dam removal. Still, Moryc said he sees a spark in Brown’s recent letter. “My hope is that there are some seeds here,” he said, “some kernels of hope in the dialogue.” SUDOKU DIFFICULTY THIS WEEK EASTERN OREGON EVENTS The place to fi nd everything happening in Eastern Oregon. Post your events. 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