Fish On
Is Hydropower Truly Green Energy?

“It will fall to fishermen to ensure that salmon and steelhead do not get lost in the fray.”

By David Lass

Before we get into this week’s article, I want to remind everyone about a wonderful event coming up on Sept. 25 – the Great Sierra River Cleanup. Trout Unlimited, Sierra Business Council and Sierra Nevada Conservancy will be cleaning six to seven sites along the Truckee River and its tributaries. Visit www.truckeetu.org or www.sbcouncil.org/Events/GSRC to volunteer.

In the last century, California’s thirst for electrical power led to the construction of a vast network of hydroelectric dams that helped decimate the state’s formerly abundant populations of salmon and steelhead. Now, largely out of the public eye, that same thirst for power is threatening the untapped rivers of British Columbia, where private companies have filed applications to build more than 600 new hydroelectric projects on some of the most productive salmon and steelhead rivers in the world, with an eye toward feeding the lucrative California energy market. For the past several years, these companies have teamed up with California’s largest utility, Pacific Gas & Electric, to promote a change to California’s renewable energy law that could make these harmful new projects a reality.

California has some of the strongest renewable energy requirements in the world. Enacted in 2002, these requirements mandate that California utilities provide at least 20 percent of their customers’ power from renewable sources – primarily wind and solar energy – by 2010. This law has been successful, spurring the development of renewable sources and earning California a reputation as a leader in the effort to reduce the nation’s carbon emissions and dependence on oil land gas. The state legislature is now considering SB 722 that would set the bar higher, requiring that 33 percent of the state’s power come from renewable sources by 2020.

Current law recognizes that there is nothing renewable about fish-killing dams. It defines renewable energy to exclude any hydroelectric project that is larger than 30 megawatts, or that “will cause an adverse impact on instream beneficial uses or cause a change in the volume or timing of streamflow.”
Given California’s disastrous experience with hydropower – which has destroyed or cut off habitat that once supported some of the largest anadromous fish runs in the world – this definition makes sense. But in recent years, PG&E has become increasingly unhappy with it. With the support of Canadian power producers, PG&E has made several attempts to convince the legislature and the state power commission to weaken the definition to allow more dams to be considered renewable.

In proposing the weakened definition, these companies have their sights set on the salmon and steelhead rivers of British Columbia. For many years, Canadian speculators have dreamed of building new hydro projects to harness the flows of rivers like the Thompson and the Campbell. To make these proposed projects economically viable, the companies need a guaranteed market for the electricity they would generate – a market larger than the province’s own consumers are likely to provide for many years. To solve this problem, the companies have been looking across the border to the U.S., and particularly to California, the largest and most lucrative energy market of all. If they could sell their new power as renewable energy, companies on both sides of the border would benefit. Canadian speculators would have the guaranteed customer base that would make the new hydro projects viable, while PG&E would have a relatively cheap source of power to meet the new 33 percent renewable energy requirement.

The problem is that the new hydropower projects are not green at all. These so-called “run-of-the-river” projects typically consist of an upstream dam that diverts a large portion of the river’s flow into an artificial offstream channel leading to a set of power turbines, and then returns the water to the river at some point downstream. The effects to fish and their habitat can be devastating. According to a report prepared by the Canadian nonprofit group Watershed Watch, these projects often divert a huge portion of the streamflow – as much as 80 percent during periods of peak power demand – and cause flows to fluctuate severely below the point of diversion. This can destroy fish eggs, strand insects and alter key components of habitat like riffle/pool structure and large woody debris. They also can kill fish by entraining them directly, and can pollute downstream water by raising temperatures and lowering levels of dissolved oxygen.

Compounding the above problems is the fact that current British Columbia law allows many projects to be approved with little public involvement or oversight. Projects smaller than 50 megawatts – enough power to supply around 50,000 homes – are exempt from review under the provincial Environmental Assessment Act. The laws that do apply contain few or no requirements to notify the public of an application. While government officials must, in theory, consider environmental impacts before approving hydro projects, in practice these laws contain few substantive standards, and instead give them great discretion over what conditions to impose. Any conditions they do impose are almost always based on analysis prepared by the company’s hired consultants, and the general public has no right to appeal the final permit decision.

The upshot is that British Columbia does not contain adequate safeguards to prevent the approval of projects that are harmful to salmon and steelhead. Indeed, even PG&E admits that these projects do not meet the current legal definition of renewable – that’s why it is proposing to weaken that definition. If it is able to do so, it will provide strong incentives that will virtually ensure that many of the proposed projects are built. As a result, the same demand for energy that helped destroy California’s own salmon and steelhead fisheries would threaten British Columbia’s fisheries, as well.

California river advocates have mobilized in opposition to PG&E’s amendment. The California Hydropower Reform Coalition, an alliance including Trout Unlimited and California Trout, is urging legislators to retain the current definition of renewable energy that excludes projects that harm fish. They also are urging residents who care about salmon and steelhead to contact their legislators.

With so much of the discussion focused on reducing carbon, there is a danger that lawmakers will succumb to the temptation to label any source of energy that is nominally emission-free as green energy. It will fall to fishermen to ensure that salmon and steelhead do not get lost in the fray.

David runs the Truckee-Tahoe Office for Trout Unlimited, the oldest and largest coldwater conservation organization in the country. He can be reached at (530) 587-7110 or dlass@tu.org.