Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: After more than a century of diverting water from the Eel river to generate hydropower and support agriculture, the Potter Valley Project is now moving toward full decommissioning. PGE has taken another major step towards removing the Eel river dams by releasing its final draft surrender application and decommissioning plan. The plan outlines the process for dismantling the Scott and Cape Horn dams, a move that would make the Eel River California's longest free flowing river. A public comment period is now open until March 3, and PGE is hosting a virtual meeting on February 6 to discuss the regulatory process.
For more, we spoke with Alicia Heyman, the executive director of Friends of the.
[00:00:55] Speaker B: Eel river, and all of the listeners should know by now that Friends of the Eel river works for the recovery of the wild and scenic Eel river. And we are just incredibly excited about the progress that's been made toward dam removal and have some actually exciting news to share on that front.
[00:01:15] Speaker A: Since the early 1900s, the Potter Valley Project at the headwaters of the mainstem Eel river in Mendocino and Lake counties has diverted water to generate hydropower and support agriculture. However, concerns over aging infrastructure, seismic risks and devastating impacts on fish populations have driven a long standing movement for dam removal.
Now, after decades of advocacy from groups like Friends of the eel river, the Wiat tribe and other conservationists, PG&D has confirmed its plans for dam removal.
[00:01:55] Speaker B: There are two dams in the headwaters of the Eel Scott Dam and Cape Horn Dam, and collectively they're known as the Potter Valley Project. Those dams also include an out of basin diversion that takes water from the Eel and diverts it into the Russian river. And back in 2022, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which is the federal agency that regulates hydropower projects, the license for these dams through that commission expired and since pge, who owns the Potter Valley Project, has been working to to prepare to decommission and remove the dams.
[00:02:35] Speaker A: Despite being designed for power generation, the Potter Valley Project's capacity is outdated, operating at only 50% efficiency over the last decade. But for over a century, the project has diverted water from the Eel river to the Russian river watershed, benefiting agriculture in southern Mendocino, Sonoma and North Submarine counties.
However, environmentalists and tribal members argue that this has come at a high cost, blocking anadromous salmonid species from accessing vital upstream habitat due to the Scott Dam.
In 2019, PG&D determined that renewing the project's license was not in the best interest of its customers and withdrew its intent to renew the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, FERC then sought new applicants to take over the project. However, no suitable candidates came forward.
As a result, FERC directed PG and D to submit a surrender application in December of 2023. And just last week on January 31, PG&E released its final draft surrender application and decommissioning plan.
[00:03:54] Speaker B: You know what we've seen thus far from PG and E is a lot of plans to make plans. And I have to say that this draft license surrender application is a little bit of that same planning to make future plans, but it is a bit more in depth.
[00:04:12] Speaker A: You can view the two 100 page document on PGE's website dedicated to the surrender process at Potter Valley surrender proceeding.com you can use the password capital PV surrender to access the final draft surrender application and decommissioning plan in full. We asked Heyman if Friends of the Eel river has reviewed the document and to share her takeaways.
[00:04:43] Speaker B: The document does confirm that PGE is going to use the rapid removal process to remove Scott Dam. This has been outlined in previous documents, but essentially rapid removal would take about two years. It would result in flushing a very large volume of sediment downstream, roughly 12 million cubic yards. And this is likely to cause some serious impacts, but the impacts will be limited in temporal scope. So the impacts will happen over a really short period of time, which we believe is a better option for the river than say a phased removal, which would happen over three to four years and result in sediment releases that extend for a much longer period of time.
[00:05:31] Speaker A: Bordering a portion of the northern Eel river watershed is the Klamath watershed, which recently made history with the largest dam removal project ever undertaken. We asked what lessons can be learned from this historic effort.
[00:05:48] Speaker B: You know, as we saw in the Klamath, they had a similar process that resulted in a really high suspended sediment yield during short periods of time. And as we saw there, these fish are really resilient and so I think we need to keep that in mind and not over engineer a solution, so to speak.
[00:06:08] Speaker A: On Thursday, February 6, PG&E is hosting a virtual meeting from 10am to 11:30am to share information on the final draft surrender application and discuss the regulatory process. Tribal representatives, resource agencies, non governmental organizations and the general public are encouraged to attend. While Haman doesn't expect to learn anything new from the meeting, she encourages the public to submit comments on the document before the early March deadline.
[00:06:43] Speaker B: They said that they will be doing a pres. An informational presentation on the layout of their document, so I don't honestly expect to learn too much. It sounds like they're kind of going to walk people through the table of contents, make sure that the information is accessible to everyone as far as how people can provide meaningful content. By the March 3rd deadline, we have information on our website and on our social media feeds on Facebook and Instagram where people can find the email address or the mailing address to provide comments to pge. I do want to make sure people understand that just like when PG and E released a previous draft, these comments are only going to pge and in previous times they did not share anyone else's comments with the public. And so we we may see that PGE just takes in these comments and we're not really sure what they do with them as they prepare their final application that's due in July.
[00:07:42] Speaker A: Friends of the Eel river says it will be closely reviewing the document and sharing their comments with PG and E and the public.
[00:07:51] Speaker B: Folks can stay tuned to eelriver.org or like I said, our social media accounts Friends Eel river to to see some more tips from us. But you know, really, I think what PGE needs to hear is that it's important that they start developing their aquatic management plans and really start thinking about and putting resources into planning for dam removal as soon as possible. PGE keeps saying that this will be the fastest FERC dam removal on record and that they're going to start taking those dams out in 2028 and I would love to see that happen. But 2028 is coming up very quickly and PGE has a lot of work to do between now and then to make sure that dam removal is done correctly.
[00:08:37] Speaker A: KMED News will be covering the meeting and sharing highlights and updates on a later newscast. In closing, the executive director of Friends of the Eel river says she is cautiously optimistic about Eel river dam removal.
[00:08:52] Speaker B: There is so much hope for recovery on the Eel river and that soon we are going to see the eel's native fish return to the hundreds of miles of excellent habitat in the upper basin. And I just want to encourage everyone to keep their eye on that prize.
[00:09:07] Speaker A: KMED News reached out to PG and D for comment to learn more about the final draft surrender application and decrease commissioning plan. However, we have not heard back as of news time. Public comments on the final draft must be in writing and are due to PG and E by March 3rd. In a press release, PGE stated that it will review comments received and expects to file its final surrender application and decommissioning plan with FERC in July of this year. You can find a link to that document and tomorrow's public meeting by visiting kmud.org.
