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PGE will remove 2 dams in basin of Sandy River

By JONATHAN BRINCKMAN
Oregonian

What has been debated for three years is now real: Portland General Electric will remove two dams in the Sandy River basin, just outside the western edge of the Mount Hood National Forest. The Marmot Dam, on the Sandy River, will go in 2007, and the Little Sandy Dam, on the Little Sandy River, will go in 2008.

The actions will greatly improve conditions for salmon and steelhead and relieve PGE, which owns the dams, of maintaining a low-output generating system at high cost. The utility also will transfer 1,500 acres of lands near the dams to a nonprofit organization toward the creation of a 5,000-acre nature reserve.

A settlement agreement detailing removal of the dams is to be signed Oct. 24 by PGE, four federal agencies, four state agencies, four conservation groups and others. Details of the plan were made public Friday at a meeting of the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission."This is very exciting," said Ed Bowles, the Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife's fisheries chief. "Everyone has come together to make this happen."

The plan joins recent and ongoing efforts throughout the Pacific Northwest to restore rivers to their natural, unimpeded flows and improve wildlife habitat. In 1998, Jackson Street Dam in Medford became the first Oregon dam to go after then-Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt struck the first blow with a sledgehammer. The Little Sandy and Marmot dams will become Nos. 2 and 3.

The idea of removing the Little Sandy and Marmot dams, raised in May 1999 by PGE, struck nerves despite endorsement by Gov. John Kitzhaber, Portland officials and the National Marine Fisheries Service. The idea was put on ice after the state failed to deliver a $10 million grant to PGE to help cover dam-removal costs -- and after Sandy River anglers learned that the state might stop stocking the river with hatchery steelhead and salmon if the Marmot dam were removed.

That's changed in the new plan.

Without the Marmot dam, there was thought to be no way to prevent hatchery fish from moving upriver, above the site of the dam, and spawning with wild fish; now, wild salmon are allowed past the dam while hatchery fish are blocked.

But the state Department of Fish and Wildlife will guarantee that all hatchery-raised winter steelhead and spring chinook released in the river will be the progeny of wild parents, which department biologists are now catching at Marmot. And hatchery-raised fish will be released farther downriver, near the city of Sandy and not at the Marmot site, making them less likely to reach and spawn in areas home to wild fish.

Prized recreation grounds The second key impediment --silt removal and possible ecosystem damage -- was cleared, too.

PGE and state biologists Friday said they have developed a way to remove Marmot Dam without the $6 million expense and disturbance of manually digging and transporting off-site about 1 million cubic yards of sediment behind the dam. Engineers instead will build a temporary dam at the site, probably out of river rocks, to hold sediments until the first spring floods; at that point, massive river flows would burst through the dam, carrying sediments downstream.

The Little Sandy and Sandy rivers have long been prized recreation and fishing grounds close to Portland. Once-wary anglers at Friday's meeting said they now support dam removal and that returns of hatchery fish could even increase if eggs from wild salmon were used."There were a lot of issues to be worked out," said Phil Donovan, a representative of the Northwest Steelheaders and the Northwest Sportfishing Industry Association. "We're really happy that they were."

Conservationists who had argued for removal of dams were delighted.

"We are thrilled to see this," said Jim Myron of Oregon Trout. "It's a big deal."Dams produce little power

PGE's license to operate the dams, issued by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, expires Nov. 15, 2004. Julie Keil, director of hydro licensing for PGE, said the company plans to notify FERC by this Nov. 15 that it will not seek to renew its operating license. The dams cannot be removed without permission from FERC.

The dams produce about 10 megawatts of electricity, less than 1 percent of the 2,000 megawatts of electricity PGE generates. They are expensive to operate because power is produced by an elaborate system that involves first sending water from Marmot Dam to Little Sandy Dam, then sending it to Rosalyn Lake, and then sending it to a generating station on nearby Bull Run River.

Keil said it would have cost more than the dams are worth to upgrade their fish-passage facilities to the level that would have been required for license renewal. Removing the dams will cost about $16 million, she said.

PGE's river water rights will transfer to the state to ensure fish will get the water they need, officials said. The Western Rivers Conservancy, a Portland nonprofit group, will receive the 1,500 acres of PGE land, said Mark Fryberg, a PGE spokesman.

One loss will be Rosalyn Lake. That small lake, now a popular fishing spot in a park operated by PGE, will disappear. "We couldn't get water to it," Keil said.

Jonathan Brinckman: 503-221-8190; jbrinckman@news.oregonian.com.

Oregonian
Portland, Oregon
October 12, 2002

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