Destroy the Dams, Save the Salmon, End Source of Greenhouse Gases

June 5, 2007 ; Page A21

To say that all dams are beneficial and should be protected, as Shikha Dalmia maintains in her May 30 editorial-page commentary "Dam the Salmon¹," is as absurd as saying all dams are bad and should be removed.

American Rivers has signed dozens of agreements enabling hydroelectric dams to continue generating thousands of megawatts of electricity on rivers around the country. We have even supported expanding electricity generation at some dams.

But some dams are being removed because they are public safety hazards or they are no longer cost-effective for their owners to operate. For decades, hydro dams have been subsidized by taxpayer dollars, and are now used to subsidize all sorts of private interests. Are you supposed to be horrified when an outmoded 100-year-old factory closes its doors? Of course not. But that's exactly the sort of irrational economic logic Ms. Dalmia proposes should protect all hydro dams into the infinite future.

On the Klamath River , dam removal would help restore salmon runs, the backbone of local coastal economies. The California Energy Commission found that with the money PacifiCorp would spend to modernize the dams, the company could replace the entire Klamath project generation with a 170-megawatt wind plant, a 100-megawatt solar plant, or it could make efficiency upgrades to its distribution system. In short, removing the Klamath dams can be done without increasing greenhouse gas emissions.

Rebecca Wodder
President
American Rivers
Seattle

Ms. Dalmia's commentary about the destruction of the Klamath River in Northern California was a symphony of misinformation, strategically omitting key aspects of the issue.

First, she frames the entire issue as driven by crazed environmentalists, declining to mention that the dams have devastated the multi-million-dollar West Coast salmon fishing industry and the communities that depend on it. Opportunistically, she prefers to caricature "eco-warriors," rather than mention that much of the campaign to remove the Klamath dams is driven by the Pacific Coast Federation of Fishermen's Associations and other affected communities.

Second, she neglects to mention at any point that a staggering 95% of the Klamath's native salmon population has been destroyed. Stepping in to protect the remaining 5% of a critical species is hardly a "radical" environmental position.

Third, she alleges that environmentalists have "rejected all attempts by PacifiCorp . . . to take mitigation steps . . . to create a salmon pathway." This is not true. PacifiCorp only considered mitigation because it was required to and its only genuine proposal was to catch migrating salmon, load them into trucks and drive them upstream -- a plan best characterized as absurd. Would it be providing this peculiar taxi service in perpetuity?

Fourth, while Ms. Dalmia does mention that neither Oregon nor California characterize hydropower as "clean energy," she offers no explanation. Both states recognize the downside of devastating fish stocks. In addition, recent research demonstrates that reservoirs like those created by the Klamath dams are major producers of greenhouse gases.

And finally, she neglects to mention that removing the dams is far cheaper than the federally mandated mitigation. In other words, PacifiCorp.'s ratepayers would be better served by dam removal.

Peter T. Ferenbach
Executive Director
Friends of the River
Sacramento , Calif.

Ms. Dalmia seems perplexed that there might be trade-offs between energy production and the environment. To her, the Klamath River hydroelectric dams produce "cheap, renewable energy."

There is nothing "cheap and renewable" about energy production that results in the destruction of wild salmon and steelhead runs and the jobs that depend on them. Her "cheap energy" requires enormous, ongoing, direct and indirect public subsidies.

There are many of us who acknowledge the problem of carbon dioxide emissions, but also recognize the social and economic value of free flowing rivers, wild fish and the jobs they provide. I would prefer to pay more for energy so that resources could be invested in energy conservation or have my electricity be generated by nuclear power.

By the way, two of the dams Ms. Dalmia cites as being on the "hit list" -- Elwha River and Matilija dams -- are completely silted in and generate no power, but still obstruct salmon and steelhead. I guess they could remain as monuments to "cheap and renewable" energy and that elusive "free lunch."

Scott Christensen
Kensington, Calif.