Left high and dry, salmon make powerful friends in Nevada

By Phoebe Sweet

Friday, Sept. 21, 2007 | 7:06 a.m.

The fishermen who remember salmon running thick in Northern Nevada's rivers are gone.

And what salmon they were, shimmering beauties that began and ended their lives in Nevada waters, hatching in Elko and Humboldt counties and traveling thousands of miles through Idaho and Washington and Oregon and the Pacific Ocean before returning nearly a decade later to spawn.

But that was almost 100 years ago, when Chinook salmon and steelhead trout could fend for themselves.

After a century of commercial and sport fishing, environmental damage, habitat destruction and dam construction along the Columbia and Snake Rivers in Idaho, their populations have dwindled. Species of fish that once grew to more than 30 pounds before ending their lives in tributaries of the Snake in Nevada are now on the endangered species list.

Outdoorsmen say the fish can no longer make it on their own.

Enter a new advocate.

Sen. Harry Reid last month asked the federal government to require utility Idaho Power to install fish passages at three dams in Hells Canyon on the Snake River. Idaho Power has applied for renewal of its license to operate the dam, an opportunity for the feds to impose new requirements on the company over its 30- to 50-year term.

"I ask that you ... seize upon this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make it possible for these great and endangered species to return to their historical spawning grounds in Nevada," Reid wrote to the federal commission that will review the power company's license application.

An environmental review completed last month, which the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission will evaluate , did not recommend installing salmon ladders. But when FERC rules on the application and environmental review, it could force the company to install the passages, essentially sets of watery stairs alongside the dam for fish to jump up.

Idaho Power, which gets about one-third of its electricity from three dams in Hells Canyon, says water quality above the dams is too poor to support successful reintroduction of salmon populations.

But Reid's letter asks FERC to require Idaho Power to remedy those water-quality problems, another condition the commission could impose and one that could cost the power company millions of dollars a year.

Dennis Lopez, a spokesman for Idaho Power, said the water-quality problems are "mostly human caused " but not related to the dams.

He also said the cost of the fish passages was not the main reason the company does not want to install them.

According to the environmental review, a fish passage could cost more than $6 million.

Idaho has the lowest power rates in the nation, about half Nevada's rates, and gets two-thirds of its power from 17 hydroelectric dams.

According to the environmental review, Idaho Power runs fish hatcheries to help bolster populations downstream from Hells Canyon. The review also says the company's nine dams along the Snake River affect water quality and not only affect current fish populations but also harm efforts to reintroduce the fish to the river.

A program to bring the salmon back to the area has met little success, and Congress is considering a bill to bring new science and life into the program.

Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., came out in support of the bill last month, and a spokesman said the congresswoman agrees with Reid's efforts to bring fish passages to Hells Canyon and salmon back to Nevada waters.

"Salmon are a symbol of the West and an important marker of the health of our rivers," said David Cherry, Berkley's communications director. "If we can't sustain a salmon population, what does that say about how well we're managing these rivers?"

But it's unclear whether Reid's and Berkley's support is enough to save the salmon.

Jon Summers, a spokesman for Reid, said the senator hopes FERC will consider his letter when renewing Idaho Power's licenses to operate its dams.

"Salmon have been spawning in Nevada for thousands of years and these dams have made it impossible for them to swim upstream," Summers said.

Eight of Idaho Power's dams - including the Brownlee, Oxbow and Hells Canyon dams in Hells Canyon - are up for license renewal by 2010.

Construction began on the Hells Canyon dams in 1955. By 1968 all three dams were generating power.

Although over fishing had already affected salmon populations in the area, the dams made it nearly impossible for the salmon to travel past Hells Canyon and into Nevada.

If the fish could once again make their epic trek into the Owyhee and Bruno rivers and Salmon Falls Creek in Nevada, the sport fishing industry would be a boon to rural communities, said Assemblyman David Bobzien, D-Reno.

Even if that occurs, though, Nevada is unlikely to see salmon so populous they make their way into farmers' irrigation ditches, as written accounts say they did 100 years ago.

But Larry Johnson, president of Coalition for Nevada's Wildlife, said he hopes to see the fish spawn here again.

"We are not a radical environmental group that's advocating tearing down every dam," Johnson said. "We fully recognize the needs of people come first, but a lot of things done in the past did not recognize the consequences to the environment, to wildlife, to fish."

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