Oregon Water Online
© Oregon Water CoalitionArchive for May, 2008
NW families, businesses to invest billions more in salmon recovery
Plans for spending nearly $9 billion more in the next 10 years on protecting endangered salmon runs in the Columbia and Snake rivers need to be based on strong science and collaboration to insure that the investment by families and businesses in the Northwest is not wasted, Northwest RiverPartners said Monday.
Terry Flores, executive director of the alliance, called for using the latest fisheries research and giving the region’s electricity customers a strong voice in implementing the federal hydro system biological opinion released today.
“Families and businesses in the Northwest are already paying 20 to 30 percent a month on their electricity bills for fish and wildlife programs,” Flores said.
“This latest salmon plan could add considerably more to customer bills in these difficult times with families struggling to put increasingly expensive food on the table and pay rapidly escalating costs for gasoline and energy.”
Flores noted that the region’s utility customers have paid $9 billion over the past 20 years on fish and wildlife programs based on the recommendations of state fish agencies and tribes.
“The answer to salmon recovery is not to throw more money at it, but to ensure that the dollars are well spent and delivers results,” Flores said. “To accomplish that the customers making the investment must have a place at the implementation table along with the states and tribes.”
The federal biological opinion calls for massive investments in habitat affected by the federal dams on the Columbia and Snake Rivers in addition to dam improvements, new and expanded hatcheries and
predation controls.
“Yet the direct killing or harvesting of salmon under the protection of the Endangered Species Act continues to be neglected,” Flores said. “The biological opinion released today on Lower Columbia commercial, sport and tribal harvest allows the continued taking of listed fish instead of conserving them.
“Our concern is that the massive investment being made by regional electricity customers will be compromised if harvest is allowed to continue at unsustainable rates.”
Corps moves ahead on juvenile fish passage project
Federal, state and tribal officials have yet to prioritize which research and construction projects will be funded in the fiscal year 2009 budget for the Columbia River Fish Mitigation program, but they’ll have to fit their choices around construction of a second spillwall below The Dalles Dam.
Preliminary estimates are that the 850-foot-long spillwall will cost $19 million in 2009 and a like amount in 2010 to complete construction.
By providing migrating juvenile fish a direct route to the deepest, fastest channel of the river, it is estimated that the spillwall will improve dam-passage survival by 4 percent for yearling chinook salmon and steelhead and 3 percent for subyearling fall chinook, according to an overview of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers project.
“The contract’s out on the street,” Corps project manager Lance Helwig said of the call for bids. The Corps, which operates the dams, plans to review the bids received and likely choose the winner in mid-July.
Construction would begin in the fall and likely extend through an Oct. 1 through April 10 work window in both years. The normal winter work window is Dec. 1-Feb. 28 but more time is needed because the spill wall is such a large project and involves so-much in-water work, Helwig said. Such work is planned in midwinter when the fewest number of migrating salmonids are in the river.
Spillway survival has long been an issue at the dam, and roughly 80 percent of the outmigrants use that route of passage. The rest go through the turbines or its trash sluiceway, the latter having the highest survival rate of the three passage routes. The Dalles Dam has no mechanical juvenile passage system as do the other dams in the federal Columbia/Snake hydro system.
A 100-foot spillwall between spillbays 6 and 7 was completed in 2004 in an attempt to reduce direct mortality and predation, primarily by northern pikeminnow, by disrupting a lateral flow below the spillbays that seemed to serve the salmon up for waiting predators.
The sideways flow seemed to batter fish, injuring and/or killing many. “At the same time, they’d get tired, fatigued,” which made them more susceptible to predators, Helwig said.
Overall spillway mortality, percentage-wise, could be at times in the high teens, according to the Corps’ Mike Langeslay.
The wall “broke up that lateral component” and resulted in reduced direct mortality and injury. The predation issue, however, just changed complexion. The altered flow resulted in some of the fish passing over a shallow spillway shelf where avian and fish predators awaited.
The egress route also passed the Bridge Islands a short distance below, where shallow, slow currents also gave predators an edge.
Langeslay said the current dam survival scenario was not worsened, but the continuing predation reduced the anticipated benefit from the 100-foot wall.
The planned wall is expected to provide fish quicker egress and a direct conveyance from the spillbays to the thalweg, the main river channel where the young salmon have a chance of out swimming the pikeminnow.
The new spillwall will jut straight downriver from, roughly, the middle of the 20-spillbay spillway. It will have a slight bend at the end, shaped somewhat like a hockey stick. The wall will be 10 feet wide and 43 feet high for its first 200 feet and 25 to 30 feet high for the remainder of its length.
Engineers had considered an extension of the existing spillwall to the thalweg. But modeling showed the extension would likely cause an unacceptable increase in total dissolved gas, which can be harmful to fish, while the proposed new structure would not significantly change TDG.
“We went through a pretty rigorous numerical analysis of that” last summer before deciding to build the new wall, Helwig said. The strategy received the blessing of regional entities involved in the process. In a CRFM program rating system used to prioritize projects, the new spillway received a score of 4.9 on a scale of 5 in voting by representatives of federal, state and tribal fish and wildlife and hydro entities.
The proposal was reviewed in technical committees that included representatives of the Corps, NOAA Fisheries Service, the Bonneville Power Administration, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Idaho, Oregon and Washington fish management entities, the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission and the Northwest Power and Conservation Council.
Proposals for CRFM program funding are prioritized by the System Configuration Team, which has that same membership.
The overall survival rate is also expected to be higher with the new wall, as the wall location will allow spill to be directed, even during high springtime flows when more of the spillbays must be opened.
The new wall, and a spill pattern to be developed over the next two years, will help move the young fish quickly and directly out of the spillway to deep water and help them avoid the shallow south side of the river Bridge Islands
Langeslay said a goal is to lift spillway survival to 98 percent. Under the current configuration, as an example, spillway survival for spring chinook was 92.4 percent.
“We believe we can,” Langeslay said of what would be one of the single biggest survival gains still on the table within the Federal Columbia River Power System. Capital improvements at the dams over the past 20 years have slowly improved survival to the point that additional gains are hard to get.
A new NOAA Fisheries Service biological opinion for the FCRPS calls for hydro system improvements aimed at achieving specific performance standards — 96 percent per dam passage survival for spring juveniles and 93 percent per dam passage survival for summer juvenile migrants averaged across the Columbia or Snake river dams by the end of a ten-year period. The spillwall is one of the actions called for in the BiOp, in time for the 2010 outmigration.
ESA impact limits force shut-down of Columbia fish harvest
With the prospect of breaching newly established Endangered Species Act “incidental take” limits, the states of Oregon and Washington and treaty tribes have all but ended, for now, Columbia River mainstem fish harvest activity.
The states decided Monday that the lower Columbia River will remain closed to steelhead fishing until further notice to avoid the incidental catch of protected upriver spring chinook salmon. The announcement effectively delays a fishery for hatchery steelhead scheduled to open May 16 from the Interstate 5 Bridge at Portland downriver to the Rocky Point/Tongue Point line a few miles east of Astoria.
The steelhead closure could extend as late as June 15, unless returns of upriver spring chinook begin to pick up, said Cindy LeFleur, WDFW Columbia River policy coordinator. Starting then the chinook salmon passing the dam are counted as “summer” chinook and a new fishery management period begins.
“With returns of upriver spring chinook falling far short of expectations, we need to do everything we can to conserve protected runs,” she said. “At this point, that means some fisheries that have only an incidental impact on upriver chinook will be affected.”
The closures were triggered by an updated spring chinook run forecast of 180,000 adult returns to the mouth of the Columbia, down from 269,300 fish initially projected by fishery managers from the states, tribes and federal agencies.
The falling upriver spring chinook forecasts have put the states and tribes in jeopardy of surpassing ESA limits on the take of listed stocks, wild Snake River spring/summer and Upper Columbia spring chinook.
If the final run tally is 180,000 adult upriver chinook, the catch in hand would represent an estimated 2.04 percent impact on upriver spring chinook for non-tribal sport and commercial mainstem fisheries.
A new harvest biological opinion approved last week by NOAA Fisheries Service says those impacts must be limited to 1.9 percent or less for returns that number 217,000 or fewer.
Non-tribal commercial and sport fisheries require that unmarked, presumably wild, listed fish, be released. But mortality is incurred because a percentage of those released chinook later die. A high percentage of hatchery fish are marked by clipping their adipose fin.
Likewise, tribal fisheries are over their ESA impact limit unless salmon passage at Bonneville Dam picks up in the coming days. Tribal impacts on the upriver chinook run are estimated to be 9.6 percent as compared to the 9.1 percent cap.
Highly successful non-Indian sport and commercial and tribal spring fisheries prompted the belief that the actual abundance of upriver chinook would come close to matching preseason forecasts.
“All of the fisheries performed above expectations,” the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife’s John North said of high lower river sport catch rates and strong outings by the non-tribal commercial fleet.
But the counts at Bonneville have bobbed up and down, not reaching the levels needed to assure a higher final tally. The upriver spring chinook are bound for hatcheries and tributary spawning grounds above Bonneville in Idaho, Oregon and Washington.
Draft EIS considers more water from Lake Roosevelt
The Washington Department of Ecology has released a draft supplemental environmental impact statement that analyzes options for additional allocations of water currently stored behind Grand Coulee Dam. The draft SEIS evaluates numerous policy choices for determining who will receive the additional water and the timing of releases of that water from Lake Roosevelt. The additional water is being made available through Washington state’s Columbia River.
Basin Water Management Program, authorized by the Legislature in 2006. Ecology proposes releases that will increase stream flows in the Columbia River for fish, and provide water to the Odessa Subarea, and relief to irrigators whose waters may be interrupted during drought, as well as deliver new water to cities and farms. “For the first time in many years we’ll be able to issue new water rights from the Columbia River and do so in a way that balances both the environmental and economic needs of the region,” said Derek Sandison, Ecology’s central regional director in Yakima.
The draft SEIS looks at three scenarios for releasing the water based on time of year, demand, and to maximize fish flows. In addition, the document considers policy options for who receives the water. Under consideration are the impacts associated with releasing up to 132,500 acre feet of water from Lake Roosevelt based on a 1938 water storage right now held by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation.
According to the proposal, 82,500 acre-feet of water would be released from storage on an annual basis for the following purposes:
- 30,000 acre-feet to replace groundwater now used to irrigate agriculture in the Odessa Subarea.
- 27,500 acre-feet to enhance flows downstream of Grand Coulee Dam.
- 25,000 acre-feet for municipal and industrial use along the Columbia River.
In drought years, 50,000 acre-feet of water would be released as follows:
- 33,000 acre-feet to support existing interruptible water right holders along Columbia River mainstem.
- 17,000 acre-feet of storage water to enhance flows downstream of Grand Coulee Dam.
The draft SEIS for the proposed management program can be viewed online at:
Cool, dry April; 13th warmest on record
This past month was the coolest April in 11 years for the lower 48 United States, and fell into the lowest twenty-five percent of all Aprils based on records going back to 1895, according to an analysis by NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C
The average April temperature, 51 degrees F, during April was one degree below the 20th century mean, and was the 29th coolest, or 86th warmest, based on preliminary data.
The combined average global land and ocean surface temperatures for April ranked 13th warmest since worldwide records began in 1880.
Fifteen states, all in the Northeast, Great Lakes, and Mid-Atlantic regions, were warmer than average. New York ranked third warmest and Rhode Island, fourth warmest. Sixteen states, all west of the Mississippi, were cooler than average.
Washington state ranked second coolest and Oregon fifth coolest. The monthly temperature for Alaska was 1.2 degrees F below average, the 43rd coolest April on record.
The University of Washington’s Climate Impacts Group says April temperatures (through the 28th) were at least 2 degrees F cooler than the 1971-2000 mean throughout the Pacific Northwest, with cold departures in excess of 4 degrees F over Idaho, and eastern Oregon and Washington. This continued a pattern of colder than normal temperatures that was observed in March and, to a lesser extent, for the winter season as a whole.
April precipitation through April 28 was drier than the 1971-2000 mean throughout the PNW, with deficits exceeding 0.75 inches in magnitude in western Oregon and Washington. This pattern of dryness was also observed through the last 90 days, while for the water year (October through April 28), the precipitation pattern was more varied. The precipitation that did fall during the past winter produced an April 1st snowpack that was near or above normal for the Columbia Basin, and well above normal in the central Washington and Oregon Cascades. Consistent with this heavy snowpack, streamflows are forecast to be near or above normal for spring and summer.
The Climate Prediction Center’s outlook for May-June-July temperature in western Washington is for April’s cooler than normal temperatures to continue (greater than a 33 percent chance). For the remainder of the region, the CPC projects a greater than 33 percent chance of above normal May-June-July temperatures in southern and eastern Oregon and central Idaho, and a greater than 40 percent chance for the same in southeast Oregon and southern Idaho.
The precipitation forecast is for a continuation of April’s dry conditions throughout the region (greater than a 33 percent throughout the PNW, exceeding a 40 percent chance for the same in eastern Oregon and southern Idaho).
The forecasts should be interpreted as the tilting of odds towards general categories of conditions, and should not be viewed as a guarantee that the specified conditions will be realized. The forecasts tend to have most skill in years of significant warm or cold ENSO conditions, like this one.
For more information about PNW climate forecasts:
http://www.cses.washington.edu
NOAA’s Temperature Index highlights:
- In April, precipitation was below normal across most of the West, compared to the 1971-2000 average. Areas in California and Nevada reported their driest March-April total precipitation. Mountain snowpack, however, remained healthy with most of the intermountain and Northwest regions reporting above normal snow packs by the end of the month.
- An average of 2.4 inches fell across the contiguous U.S. in April, which is 0.04 inches below average.
- Iowa, Missouri, Virginia, and Wisconsin were much wetter than average for April, with Iowa and Wisconsin ranking fourth wettest on record. Arizona, California, Nevada, and Utah were much drier than average, with Arizona having the third driest April on record and California ranking fifth driest.
- Twenty-one tornadoes were reported on April 4 across Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, North and South Carolina. The next week, 62 tornadoes ravaged Texas and Oklahoma between April 9-11. In Richmond, Va., heavy rains from April 20-22 brought the city’s monthly total to 8.32 inches.
- Last month, Babbit, Minn., recorded 26 inches of snow, while 32 inches fell near the town of Virginia, Minn. This was the largest ever April multi-day snowfall in the Iron Range of northern Minnesota. The combination of snow melt and heavy rain continued to flood rivers and streams throughout northern Illinois and southern Wisconsin. At the end of April, major flooding was occurring on the Mississippi River between Rock Island, Ill., and Burlington, Iowa. Heavy rains in the upper reaches of the lower Mississippi River spawned historic water levels downstream.
- Bethel, Alaska, received 11.7 inches of snow during the month, bringing its seasonal total to 102.4 inches, nearly twice the average and only the second time in the last 30 years with over 100 inches of accumulated snowfall. By April 19, Nome accumulated 105.4 inches of snowfall, ranking as the second-snowiest winter on record behind 1994-95.
- Rainfall across parts of the Southeast improved drought conditions, with about 43 percent of the region classified in moderate-to-extreme drought at the end of April compared to 59 percent a month ago.
Global Highlights:
- April’s combined global land and ocean surface temperature was 0.74 degrees F above the 20th century mean of 56.7 degrees F.
- Continued weakening of La Niña, the cold phase of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, occurred during April. The global average ocean surface temperature in April was the ninth warmest on record, with a monthly anomaly of 0.59 degrees F above the 20th century mean.
- Typhoon Neoguri brought torrential rains and flash flooding to Hainan, China, April 18. This was the season’s earliest and perhaps the strongest typhoon to strike China since 1949.
- Snow cover extent over Eurasia during April 2008 was the lowest on record for April, following a record low March extent, and a marked contrast to the record January expanse. For the Northern Hemisphere, this month was the eighth least extensive April snow cover extent in the 42-year historical satellite record.
Tucson to store major CAP water supply underground
A new plant constructed in Avra Valley means Tucson can finally begin taking nearly all of its share of Colorado River water.
It means billions of gallons of Central Arizona Project water will be stored underground for use in the Tucson area.
The Southern Avra Valley Storage and Recovery Project has nine large basins that let water from the CAP canal deep percolate into the ground to be pumped out for use. The new plant combined with the Central Avra Valley Storage and Recovery Project will put about 47 billion gallons of Colorado River water into the ground a year, almost all of the city’s share of river water that flows into southern Arizona some 336 miles from Lake Havasu.
Until now Tucson was unable to take the full allotment, a city news release said. “By fall we will have all nine basins online,” said Tucson Water spokesman Mitch Basefsky.
Eventually the city will build a new pipeline and reservoir that will bring a blend of groundwater and river water into the city.
Updated basin runoff forecast 98% of average
A cooler and drier than normal April and early May has kept, for the most part, the Columbia River basin’s water supply bottled up in mountain snowpack, but forecasters say the region will eventually be blessed with an average spring-summer outpouring.
The Northwest River Forecast Center’s May 7 “final” monthly prediction is that 96.3 million acre feet will flow past the lower Columbia’s The Dalles Dam during the April-September period, which would be 98 percent of the 1971-2000 average.
Most of the Columbia-Snake river basin’s snowpack runoff funnels past The Dalles. The new forecast represents a decrease from the April 7 final prediction, which was 101 percent of average. Most of the basin saw below normal precipitation during April, some less than 50 percent. Wednesday’s forecast assumes 95 percent of average precipitation for the basin for the first half of May and normal precipitation for the rest of the season.
The Climate Impacts Group says in its April 30 climate outlook update that April temperatures (through the 28th) were at least 2 degrees F cooler than the 1971-2000 mean throughout the Pacific Northwest, with cold departures in excess of 4 degrees in Idaho, and eastern Oregon and Washington. That continued a pattern of colder than normal temperatures that was observed in March and to a lesser extent for the entire winter season, according to the University of Washington’s CIG.
A couple areas - such as central Oregon and in the Snake River’s upper reaches in southeast Idaho, the average April temperature was more than 6 degrees below normal, according to the NWRFC.
A slow warmup has taken place in recent days, starting to fill basin tributaries that have mostly have below average flows for this time of year.
The Natural Resources Conservation Council’s SNO-TEL monitoring stations show snowpacks’ snow-water equivalents well above average for this point in time.
The NWRFC’s May final forecast says the runoff past Lower Granite Dam on the lower Snake River in southeast Washington should be 100 percent of normal, 24.1 maf.
The Clearwater River, which flows into the Snake just above Lower Granite, is expected to provide 113 percent of its normal runoff. In-flows to Dworshak reservoir on the North Fork of the Clearwater are expected to be 111 percent of normal for the April-July period.
Restrictions, recycling in LA water future
Faced with drought and a jump in consumption, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has called for cleansing sewage for drinking water and imposing restrictions for watering lawns and washing driveways.
The mayor, who once opposed wastewater recycling as unsafe, unveiled a sweeping water plan that could cost up to $2 billion over 20 years. It comes as Los Angeles tries to meet a projected 15 percent increase in water demand by 2030. “For over 250 years, through dry and wet seasons, we’ve grown from 44 settlers to 4 million people and every time we needed water, our approach was the same — we pitched another straw in the ground, we marched up to the mountains, to the aqueducts in distant areas and opened up our wallets,” Villaraigosa said.
The plan includes adding treated wastewater to drinking supplies. The city constructed a system to do that in the 1990s, but abandoned it amid criticism. “This is a new day,” said David Nahai, the city’s director of water and power. “We have new technology.” Some homeowners oppose the notion of treated wastewater for drinking, calling it a “toilet to tap” approach, but Nahai said the notion that sewage will not be treated first is unfair.
“There is nothing to fear. We should not be deterred by demagoguery or ignorance. We should not allow ourselves to fall prey to catchy, facile phrases,” he said. The plan calls for a 600 percent increase in recycled water use. If the City Council approves it, Los Angeles would join other cities taking the approach, including Orange County’s $481 million plant that opened in January.
The mayor’s plan also calls for water restrictions on washing driveways and sidewalks and watering lawns at midday. Villaraigosa plans to leave rates steady and pay for his plan through existing grants and the city water and power budget. Another $500 million to $1 billion would be needed to clean up the contaminated water supply beneath the San Fernando Valley. The mayor’s office said that could be funded through suing commercial polluters.
