By SARA HOTTMAN 

H&N Staff Reporter

January 5, 2011

     Regardless of whether Klamath River dams are removed, stakeholders are going to have to reduce phosphorous and nitrogen loads in the Klamath River by tens of thousands of pounds annually.

   The federal Environmental Protection Agency last week gave final approval to a pollution reduction plan for the California portion of the river, meeting a court-ordered deadline.

   A nearly identical plan by the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality is expected to receive EPA approval by Jan. 20.

   The plans are mandated by the federal Clean Water Act and aim to improve water quality, restore fish habitats and remove toxins from the river.

   The Klamath River stretches 255 miles from Upper Klamath Lake to the Pacific Ocean in northern California.

   The EPA’s pollution reduction plan impacts communities along the river, including Klamath Falls, as well as farmers, ranchers and others in the river’s watershed.

   Advocates of the Klamath Hydroelectric Settlement Agreement, a document that advocates removal of four dams if studies indicate it’s feasible, say dam removal would help ease pollution reduction requirements by allowing the river to flow freely and removing sources of temperature and algae pollution.

   But opponents say removing dams won’t   have any impact on pollution, and would eliminate a source of power, causing electricity costs to increase.

   California’s Klamath River pollution plan is “agnostic in regard to dam removal,” said Gail Louis, environmental protection specialist, EPA water division.

   “If the dams come out, there are certain pieces (of the plan) that would be more quickly resolved,” Louis said, but the plan doesn’t depend on or expect dam removal.

   Pollution reduction plans are called total maximum daily loads, or TMDLs, and regulate   how much pollution sources such as municipalities, agriculture, and dams can release into water bodies each day.  

   New regulations

   California’s TMDL requires stakeholders to annually reduce phosphorous loads in the Klamath River by 22,000 pounds and nitrogen levels 120,000 pounds.

   A court ordered final EPA approval by the end of 2010. That approval launched a 60-day countdown for California stakeholders to write plans on how they ’ll reduce their pollution loads by the required amounts: phosphorous by 57 percent, nitrogen by 32 percent, carbonaceous biochemical oxygen demand by 16 percent.

   The most substantial reductions are required from the Oregon-California border through the Klamath Hydroelectric Project that includes dams in Klamath and Siskiyou counties. That area also must reduce temperature and algae associated with the dams.

   “The potential for dam removal could be a significant catalyst (to reduce pollutants),” said Sue Keydel, environmental scientist, EPA water division. “But it’s not going to instantaneously fix them all.”

   Dams produce heat that increases water temperature and hurts aquatic life, she said, and reservoirs behind dams are breeding grounds for algae that suck oxygen from the water and can be toxic to mammals.

   But Upper Klamath Lake, which has had a TMDL since 2002, has a blue-green algae problem and “significant loads” flow downstream to the Klamath River, impacting its TMDLs in both Oregon and California, Keydel said.  

   According to the Klamath Hydroelectric Settlement Agreement, dam owner PacifiCorp would remove four dams along the Klamath River, paid for in part by a surcharge on power customers’ bills. Over 10 years, California customers will pay $250 million and Oregon customers will pay $100 million.

   The settlement is associated with the Klamath Basin Restoration Agreement, which seeks to establish sustainable water supplies and affordable power rates for irrigators, help the Klamath Tribes acquire 92,000 acres of timberland, and fund habitat restoration and economic development in the region.