Pros And Cons Of Elwha River Removal

In 1991 the Edwards Manufacturing Company, owner of the Edwards Dam on the Kennebec River in Augusta, ME, applied to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) for a renewal of their license to operate a privately owned hydroelectric dam. Their application was denied; Edwards Manufacturing Company was required to come up with a plan for the enacting and financing of decommissioning the dam, as well as the restoration of the river. This was the first time in history that the federal government ordered a privately owned hydroelectric dam destroyed against the wishes of the owner. Numerous factors were involved which eventually led to this decision, namely the

In the ¨River Restoration Project Offers a Sprinkling of Hope¨, Ron Jacobsma, general manager of the Friant Water Authority, said “We hope to get double duty out of that water by taking it the long way around.¨ As Jacobsma is a general manager of the Friant water Authority, this offers us his experience, his ideas and his thoughts of how we can have hope for the project. President Barack Obama signed the Omnibus Public Lands Bill in March, the agreement turned into federal law when he signed it. The parties had been working on the restoration plan for more than two years laying the groundwork for the physical changes to come. When the president signed it, it made them get the approval which he supported for them to continue the process. The credibility of the author right has now been believable because he provided us with the ethics of President Obama and Jacobsma. The river will not necessarily end up to its full, natural path along its entire length. Too much has changed in the decades since the dams construction. They would use canals along some stretches to carry the water short distances and to ferry the salmon upstream. This is showing us logos with facts and information it offers an explanation on how to solve one of the problems with the plan. A professor named Peter Moyole, from UC Davis also had his opinion on the project. He said “We have never done anything on this scale”, but we were willing to try it and approve of the

However, the dams were of faulty construction. Dam number one which caused the flooding was constructed of coarse mining refuse that Pittston had dumped into the Middle Fork of Buffalo Creek starting in 1968. This dam failed first on the heels of heavy rains. The water from Dam number three then took out dams number two and then number one. Dam number three had simply

Beside these arguments, there is also a more quantitative side to the debate. The ecological detriments of the Glen Canyon Dam have been well-documented. Extensive changes were brought about in the Colorado River ecosystem by the construction of the Glen Canyon Dam. Most of these alterations negatively affected the functioning of the system and the native aquatic species of the river. The reduced supply and transport of

In 1923-1947 Arkansas Power and Light (AP&L) constructed several dams on two Arkansas lakes, Hamilton and Catherine. AP & L obtained “flood easements” on property adjoining the lakes. AP&L sold lake side property and kept the easement in force. These flood easements permitted AP&L to “clear of trees, brush, and other obstruction and to submerge by

The Impact of Hydropower Dams on California's Populations of Anadromous Fish: What can be done to mitigate the Dams Effects and Restore California's Watersheds.

Dams are harming salmon in so many ways. They’re taking away their habitat. The salmon’s access of the rivers are suddenly gone. In the Northwest, a large portion of dollars are spent in a year to fix all the damage to the salmon, caused by the dams on the Snake and Columbia rivers. For decades, there have been numerous debates about taking down these dams to help the fish, because they’re part of the endangered species act. There are biologists that notice how some salmon are trying to survive in rivers located in the Northwest that have been changed by dams. These fish are simply delaying migration back to the sea, growing larger in order to survive their trip back to the Pacific Ocean, and going back to their birth streams at higher rates than ever. All these salmon could be saving themselves instead of people spending billions of dollars. The consequences of this could be very important. The recovery of salmon

In 1992, The Elwha River Ecosystem and Fisheries Restoration Act of 1992 authorized the US Federal Government to acquire the hydroelectric power projects of Elwha Dam and Glines Canyon Dam, where are located on the Washington State for demolition for habitat restoration and decommissioning. The dam removals began in 2011 and finished in 2014. I wondering that why government decided to remove the dam and what happens in Elwha River after dam removal. In this paper, I write about the following topics: main purpose of the Elwha and Gliens Canyon dam, effects to the Elwha River as well as ecosystem after constructing dam, reasons of the dam removal, process of the dam removal, and effects after dam removal.

The State of Colorado has suffered from a water shortage in recent years; a difficult situation which is easily visible when viewing the quickly shortening length of the Colorado River. Lake Mead, for example, is roughly 130 feet lower than it once was, marked by the stained rock which towers above the current water level. “The river has become a perfect symbol of what happens when we ask too much of a limited resource: it disappears. In fact, the Colorado no longer regularly reaches the sea” (Zielinski, 2010). Legislation was implemented early on to address this issue, though the results were (perhaps not surprisingly) rather unanticipated, regarding

For starters, the dam’s vast reservoir destroys Native American communities, inundate sacred fishing spots and ancestral burial grounds, and erect an impenetrable barrier denying salmon access to their spawning grounds (American Experience, n.d.). This was a problem because the U.S. had no formal process for involving Native American tribes in Grand Coulee Dam decisions; this included the taking of reservation lands (Ortolano & Cushing 2000).

In addition, farmland has been destroyed because of the floods and the decrease in delta sediment. The dam has reduced downstream nutrients and sediment flow. And has seriously impacted neighboring river and seacoast ecosystems.

With human development, industrial pollution and other factors all contribute to the deteriorated condition of the river, which makes it difficult to determine the dams’ environmental impact in isolation. CITE That said, the current operations of the dam hamper and potentially prevent environmental improvement of the Colorado. In order to preserve some semblance of the Colorado ecosystem, man must restore the natural processes that created the ecosystem. The real question is how to do that, whether via dam decommission or a less extreme policy change.

With Boise Idaho being one of the top 20 fastest growing cities in the US the water needs are going to be increasing over the next 20 + plus. Since 2012 the growth rate has been around a growth rate of 1.8. Boise has a pretty good location, It has the Boise river running through the middle of downtown boise. There are three dams that are located on the river just out side of town. Approximately 95% of Idahoans rely on ground water for drinking water. Surface water, such as streams, rivers, reservoirs, and springs, supplies the remaining 5%(DEQ). The first one is called Lucky Peak dam and the second one is called Arrow Rock dam and the third one is called Anderson Ranch dam. The Lucky Peak dam creates the Luck Peak lake. It has a capacity of 307,000 acre foot. Then the Arrow Rock dam created Arrow Rock reservoir and that has a holding capacity of 300,850 acre foot. Then Anderson Ranch dam has a carrying capacity of around 500,000 acre foot. So the three combine around to 1 million acre foot of water storage. Boise annually receives around 12 inches of rain per year. It gets around 8 or 9 inches of snow fall that turns into snow pack for this year. The snow pack just like the rain fall all just depends on the year. So we don 't get to much from rainfall and snowpack.

Often referred to as ecosystem engineers, Castor canadensis Kuhl, or beavers, have lasting impacts on ecosystems by building dams. One main benefit of beaver dams is their ability to raise the height of water near the edges of streams, which contributes to the increased growth of plants. This ecosystem change is catalyzed by a beaver family moving into a new habitat and placing a large tree across a stream, then adding sticks, muds, stones, and smaller trees. This allows the water levels to raise behind the dam and pool water, which provides nourishment for nearby trees, ultimately increasing growth and abundance (Robbins, 2014).

Geological Survey, the sediment trapped behind the dams has washed downstream, rebuilding riverbanks and gravel bars and, in and around the river's mouth, creating some 70 acres of new beach and riverside estuary habitat for Dungeness crabs, sand lance, surf smelt, clams, and other species between 2011 and 2014. Steelhead and Coho salmon transplanted above the dam site spawned in the river's tributaries, and juvenile Coho were spotted. In the summer of 2012, Chinook salmon began migrating up the river, and by the following fall, they too had spawned in tributaries and in the Elwha mainstream. The population of salmon has begun to recover. It seems that the effects are positive (Nijhuis,