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March 30, 2009 in City
Pre-dam photos may be glimpse of future
Salmon advocates want barriers removed
This photo of Granite Point on the Snake River was taken before Lower Granite Dam inundated the canyon in 1975. Idaho libraries/special collections, Kyle Laughlin Collection
(Full-size photo)
Anyone who’s driven U.S. Highway 12 across southeast Washington’s rolling terrain into Idaho will recognize at least some of the scenery in Kyle Laughlin’s photographs.
The Snake River flows through weathered basalt canyons, bronzed by the setting sun. Orchards flourish at the river’s edge. Anglers fish for salmon and steelhead, and kids frolic on sandy beaches.
The photos were shot before the four Lower Snake River dams were built in the 1960s and 1970s. While much of the landscape is familiar, the photos capture glimpses of the pre-dam river – before the orchards and beaches were flooded by rising reservoirs, and while salmon runs were still abundant.
Laughlin, who died in 1984, spent 50 years documenting the region through photographs. The Moscow, Idaho, photographer’s work is part of a slide show put together by conservation groups, which say the pictures offer a vision of what the Lower Snake could return to if the dams were removed to restore salmon runs.
“The river really speaks through these photos,” said Jerry White, Save Our Wild Salmon’s Snake River landscape coordinator. “They show the kind of potential that this river holds to be an asset for the region.”
For 20 years, scientists and politicians have debated breaching the dams to help restore salmon runs.
The debate was largely academic during the Bush years. During a 2003 campaign stop at Ice Harbor Dam, President George W. Bush said the dams would never be breached on his watch. Government agencies offered other solutions to bolster dwindling salmon runs, such as improving fish habitat and passage through the dams.
Now the federal salmon recovery plan is in court, challenged by environmental groups. During a hearing in early March, U.S. District Court Judge James Redden said he hasn’t ruled out the possibility of eliminating dams to restore the Snake River’s once-fabled salmon runs.
“I hope it’s never done, but that’s the last fallback,” the Associated Press quoted Redden as saying.
By publicizing the historic photos, Save Our Wild Salmon is encouraging people who live along the Lower Snake to ask “what if,” said Sam Mace, the group’s Inland Northwest project director.
“What if the dams came out?” she said.
How would grain that leaves Lewiston in barges get to Portland? How could better fish returns and a free-flowing river benefit tourism in Lewiston and Clarkston? How would electricity generated by the dams be replaced?
“We want a river that works for people as well as salmon,” Mace said. “The energy piece is critical. We can’t replace the dams with polluting energy.”
However Redden rules, Lower Snake dam removal would face a rocky political path, said Tom Karier, the Eastern Washington representative of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council, which hasn’t taken a stance on dam-breaching.
“My understanding is that ordering the dams’ removal is not something a federal judge could do,” he said. “Breaching the dams would require a significant amount of money, and that would require an act of Congress.”
Climate change has upped the ante in the dam debate, Karier added.
“The dams have an impact on salmon runs, but they also don’t emit any carbon,” he said. “That’s the core of the conflict.”
Together, the four dams generate about 1,000 megawatts of electricity – enough to power Seattle, but still a relatively small slice of the Northwest’s overall energy needs. In a 2006 report, the Northwest Energy Coalition’s Steve Weiss said the lost electricity could be replaced through conservation and wind power. The coalition advocates for renewable energy and conservation.
But the 2006 report was criticized for underestimating the cost of replacement power. In a new report issued last week, Weiss said gas-fired turbines would be needed to replace the dams’ “peaking ability” – the flexibility dam operators have to increase output during cold snaps or hot spells, when energy use peaks from furnaces and air conditioners.
The Northwest Power and Conservation Council did its own study, using models that replaced the dams’ output with electricity from gas-fired turbines and coal plants. The models showed a net annual increase in carbon emissions of 3.6 million tons by 2024.
“As a region, we’re working hard to expand our renewable and carbon-free energy,” Karier said. “This would set back our progress.”
Mace, of Save Our Wild Salmon, argues that climate change strengthens the case for dam-breaching. Warmer stream temperatures are expected to take a heavy toll on salmon populations by reducing the amount of habitat in which the temperature-sensitive fish can survive.
Breaching the dams would remove barriers to “the largest intact piece of salmon habitat in the Lower 48,” Mace said. “Some of these salmon species spawn at 6,500 feet. Those streams are going to stay colder longer.”
Dustin Ahern’s family has lived in the Lewiston area for four generations. He’s a whitewater rafting guide and construction worker who also runs Citizens for Progress, an economic development group.
If the dams came out, the region would have to be “made whole,” Ahern said. “There’s a fair amount of business that uses the reservoir system on the Lower Snake.”
At 35, Ahern is too young to remember prolific salmon runs, but his grandmother does. She grew up during the Great Depression. Whenever the cupboard was bare, her dad would go fishing.
“To this day, she’s not terribly fond of eating salmon. … It was a sign that you were very poor,” Ahern said.
“Now, with wild salmon running $15 to $20 per pound, it’s kind of come full circle.”
Contact Becky Kramer at (208) 765-7122 or beckyk@spokesman.com.
Miners to return to Lucky Friday 
polistra on March 30 at 9:01 a.m.
If you think this part of the country would be “glorious” without the dams, you are either stark raving mad, a terrorist or a fish.
IdahoSpringer on March 30 at 10:43 a.m.
If people want to view the full collection of historic Snake River photos go to www.workingsnakeriver.org.
Dams provide us enormous benefits to the region, but the four lower Snake River dams don’t provide benefits to outweigh their costs: costs to salmon, taxpayers, to Clarkston/Lewiston facing increased flood risk and the specter of raising their levees due to the sediment build up behind Lower Granite, etc.
However, if the dams are to be removed, transportation alternatives must be in place for farmer and other shippers, and the benefits the dams do provide must be met other ways. Dam removal can’t happen on the backs of our farmers and others.
The feds have proposed spending more than $6 billion on a recovery plan they admit won’t actually restore the fish but keeps the dams in place. We could take the dams out, make investments to our rail and highways, replace the power with clean renewable for less than $6 billion. And restore Lewiston/Clarkston historic city beaches and great river.
Respectfully,
Sam Mace
larrystclair on March 30 at 12:27 p.m.
Removal of the dams would only help the Salmon. The Corps of Engineers have dreged a channel for barge traffic 60-80 feet deep. With the dams gone this will mean that the Snake River will not be accessable to anyone from Lewiston, ID to the confluence of the Columbia River. This could make some of the rivers and streams that flow into the Snake River inaccessable to spawning Salmon.
Jerry_White on March 30 at 3:37 p.m.
First of all, helping salmon and helping people are not mutually exclusive. Helping salmon is helping people. Studies have shown that Idaho alone would benefit to the tune of $544 million per year if Snake River Basin salmon runs were recovered. The economic boost to sport and commercial fishing communities on the coast of Oregon, Washington and Alaska would also be huge.
Second, no streams that run into the lower Snake would be blocked. Neither the Tucannon River nor Alpowa Creek would be obstructed by removing dams. Up river, some 5200 miles of spawning habitat would become available to salmon in the Clearwater and Salmon Rivers.
Third, the shipping channels on the lower Snake are no deeper than 14 feet deep. Deep-water barges do not enter the 140 miles of the lower Snake.
Fourth, a free flowing lower Snake River would be a phenomenal recreational destination draw as we move into the 21st century. One only needs to look at the dollars generated by Hells Canyon boating trips to understand the potential of the lower river. This kind of asset is the reason people want to relocate and thrive in our communities. These draws create economic vitality and opportunity.
Finally, trading out of these dams into clean wind energy and efficiency is in the best interest of our region. Replacing declining, dam-supported barge traffic with rail would be both cost effective and affordable. Removing these four dams and creating real solutions for the communities that rely on them is the best way to create a sustainable economy that improves our quality of life, creates economic opportunities and revives endangered runs of salmon for present and future generations.
Best,
JW