WSPC questions salmon in Crab Creek

Irrigation district, stake holder interests both important

An aspect of the Priest Rapids Hydroelectric Project is raising the concerns of the Washington State Potato Commission.

The project, licensed by the Federal Energy Regulation Commission, consists of two of the Grant County Public Utility District's developments, Wanapum Dam and Priest Rapids Dam, which produce nearly 2,000 megawatts of low-cost hydropower, said Linda Jones, PUD director of communications and external affairs.

The PUD is in the process of relicensing the developments, a regulatory process that any non-federal hydropower operator goes through, Jones said.

"Our original license was issued in 1955 for a period of 50 years, so it's due to expire Oct. 31, 2005," Jones said. "By law, Grant PUD was required to submit a license application for a new operating process two years prior to expiration. In October 2003, Grant PUD submitted an application for a new license to operate the project."

Jones said relicensing entails the PUD to gather stake holders together and look at all the values that the project brings, including recreational opportunities, protection of fish and wildlife, protection of cultural resources, the efficiency of the plants and their ability to generate low-cost power and other natural resource protections.

Washington State Potato Commission executive director Pat Boss said that one of the issues is concerns of power rates increasing. Another issue is stocking Crab Creek, located in the Priest Rapids reservoir just south of Beverly, with salmon.

"We have some concerns about stocking Crab Creek with salmon, and I guess we want more information about that," he said. "We think that that could open up a whole can of worms if Crab Creek, which has traditionally been more of a creek or irrigation-type of channel, be made into some sort of salmon habitat."

Such a move would create a lot of issues for Moses Lake property owners, farmers and other people that may want to use Crab Creek, especially if the creek is stocked with some sort of endangered fish, Boss said. That gets the whole area into potential Endangered Species Act listing.

"We're not sure that's the best way to go here," he said. "I think that's what happening here is that, in order for Grant PUD to get relicensed, FERC is saying ' We'll relicense you but you've to do this, this and this' … For the most part, what FERC is asking Grant County PUD to do, we don't have a problem with. This Crab Creek issue is problematic for us. So that's what we're raising here."

Putting salmon into a water body impacts agriculture in two ways, Boss said. It requires setting an in-stream flow, which could curtail water use during drought years, even impacting well owners if their ground water is determined to tie into the in-stream flow.

"A lot of people will say, 'Well, we need to protect the salmon, we need to have enough water in the creek for the salmon,'" Boss said. "Our point is, there was never any salmon in that creek to begin with. Let's not create an issue here and have salmon put in the creek, which all of a sudden restricts use of the creek, restricts use of the water, everything else."

Jones said that several issues were raised regarding lower Crab Creek, including the identification of some recreational needs, terrestrial habitat needs and fishery agencies expressed a need for increasing habitat for anadromous fish, or fish which migrate up rivers from seas to breed in fresh water, in Crab Creek, such as salmon and steelhead.

"The district is supportive of the irrigation districts in efforts to exclude anadromous fish from Crab Creek," Jones said. "We are also interested in working on solutions that will satisfy the interests of the other stake holders as we develop this management plan for Crab Creek."

Jones said one of the options was the possibility of putting a barrier at the mouth of Crab Creek to block out the migration of anadromous fish. Everything is in the early stages, she said, with FERC evaluating and receiving input from all of the stake holders.

"FERC's now going to sift through all of those and continue the process of their environmental review," she said. "Ultimately, over the course of the next several years, FERC will come to a conclusion on those measures that the district will do over the next license term."

Jones said that the interests of both the irrigation districts and the stake holders are important and need to be considered.

"We need to come out of this satisfying our mutual interests," she said. "Together I think we can come up with good solutions."