Richard Salzman - the dumbass, is stirring up trouble again. (Later on he asks for money... read all connected posts.)
In a message dated 9/28/2006 10:45:59 A.M. Pacific Daylight Time, salzman@inreach.com writes:
"If PacifiCorp is going to pursue the least-cost option for their customers, they should think about removing these dams,"
”It really doesn't seem to make any sense at this point for Pacificorp to keep the dams,”
HoustonChronicle.com
Sept. 28, 2006, 3:53AM
Studies: Dam Removal Helpful, Affordable
By JEFF BARNARD Associated Press Writer
© 2006 The Associated Press
GRANTS PASS, Ore. — Removing four hydroelectric dams from the Klamath River to help struggling salmon runs there would not be as expensive as feared, studies for a state agency show.
Indian tribes, salmon fishermen and conservation groups have been pressing Portland-based utility PacifiCorp to remove the dams to help the Klamath's struggling salmon runs. The company is seeking to continue operating the dams.
The runs were so poor this year that federal fisheries managers practically shut down commercial salmon fishing off the West Coast to protect them.
The studies for the California State Coastal Conservancy found that removing the dams will not be as expensive as first believed because sediments built up behind the dams contain very low levels of toxic leftovers from gold mining, farming and plywood manufacturing.
The studies, submitted Tuesday to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, also found that only about 5 percent of the 21 million cubic yards of sediment trapped behind the dams would wash out, and it all could be gone in one winter rainy season.
PacifiCorp is seeking a new 50-year operating license from FERC to operate the damns in southern Oregon and Northern California. The dams produce a combined 150 megawatts, enough electricity for 70,000 customers and 2 percent of PacifiCorp's production.
PacifiCorp spokesman Dave Kvamme said any decision on removing the dams will take much more study. The utility has proposed trucking salmon around the dams rather than building fish ladders or removing them.
Steve Rothert, of conservation group American Rivers, said that an economic analysis by FERC found that when mandates by federal agencies for making the dams more fish-friendly are taken into account, PacifiCorp would lose $28.7 million a year operating the dams.
"If PacifiCorp is going to pursue the least-cost option for their customers, they should think about removing these dams," he said.
Federal agencies told FERC earlier this year that PacifiCorp must install fish ladders, fish screens and reduce the amount of water diverted to turbines to help struggling returns of salmon.
However, under a new change in federal law, the utility has challenged the requirements. An administrative law judge is expected to issue a ruling this week.
-----
Now is the time for each of us to act. If you called already, call again.
Tell Pacific Corp to take down the dams.
Pacific Corp is owned by MidAmerica, a consolidated subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway.
Please call CEO, David L. Sokol. He can be reached at 515.242.4300, ask to speak to Mr. Sokol's personal secretary, Babs
or email her at: btracy@midamerican.com
or write to: David Sokol MidAmerica P.O. Box 657, Des Moines, IA 50303-0657
Make it clear that no other alternative will be acceptable. The dams on the Klamath must come down. Lets do this for the salmon and for our children and their children, and lets do this in memory of Tim McKay.
Tell him we are not going away.
--
http://www.pelicannetwork.net/krc.dammedupperbasin.htm
http://www.klamathforestalliance.org/Newsarticles/newsarticle20051207.html
http://klamathrestoration.org/wp/bring-the-salmon-home-un-dam-the-klamath/
http://www.pcffa.org/klamath.htm
http://www.friendsoftheriver.org/PressRoom/2004-07-06_FOR.html
http://www.democraticleader.house.gov/press/articles.cfm?pressReleaseID=1523
----
http://www.times-standard.com/local/ci_4409798
9/28/2006
Klamath dam removal seen as safe, cheap
John Driscoll/The Times-Standard
Eureka Times Standard
But conservancy report is disputed
Just after federal regulators proposed only minor changes for a Klamath River hydroelectric project, the California Coastal Conservancy filed a report that suggests it would be safe and relatively inexpensive to take down the four dams altogether.
The conservancy report found that some 21 million cubic yards of sediment has been trapped behind the dams, built between 1908 and the 1960s. But removing the Pacificorp dams would only release one-fifth that amount, and it could be allowed to happen naturally through erosion.
A Conservancy contractor also examined the muck for contamination, but found nearly all samples were clean.
American Indian tribes, fishermen and environmental groups, as well as California agencies, have been pressing Pacificorp and federal agencies to consider taking out the dams. They block salmon and other migrating fish from historic spawning grounds that stretched upstream of Upper Klamath Lake.
That call has gotten louder in recent years, with fisheries managers cutting quotas to protect weak runs of wild salmon, devastating commercial and tribal fishing operations this year. Water supply conflicts and Pacificorp's application for a new 50-year license to run the project also have brought the issues into the spotlight. Toxic algae blooms in the reservoirs have prompted health warnings.
The study was a “fatal flaw” analysis, said Michael Bowen with the coastal conservancy.
”The discussion about decommissioning as an alternative can now proceed in an informed fashion,” Bowen said, “and the subject of toxicity as a fatal flaw is off the table.”
But Pacificorp spokesman Dave Kvamme said the analysis isn't a comprehensive environmental review of dam removal. In fact, Pacificorp believes dam removal could have big environmental impacts on fisheries and other resources.
”A full assessment, should it ever come to that, would take years of study before any strategy could be developed,” Kvamme said.
Most of the material behinds the dams is fine clay and silt, with a smaller quantity of sand and even less gravel, the report found. If all the dams were removed within the same time frame, about 3.7 million cubic yards would be washed downstream into the ocean, most of it quickly. That amount wouldn't cause flooding, according to the report.
Since there is very little contamination of the sediment, and since it wouldn't have to be excavated, the cost of decommissioning and removing the dams may be less than $100 million. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on Monday recommended that none of the dams be removed. However, it did estimate the cost of removing them to be $77 million if the sediment didn't have to be mechanically removed.
That's substantially less than the $200 million or more it's expected to cost if Pacificorp is forced to install fish ladders to allow salmon to migrate above the dams. There is still some uncertainty as to whether that will be a requirement, as an administrative law judge is mulling whether any spawning habitat exists within the project, among other issues, which may have a profound effect on the final demands.
”It really doesn't seem to make any sense at this point for Pacificorp to keep the dams,” said Steve Rothert of American Rivers.
Not everyone wants the dams to come out. Some people who live around the reservoirs say their property values and businesses would suffer if the dams were removed.
Salmon haven't been far up the Klamath for nearly 90 years, wrote Charlene Walden of Hornbrook.
”The damage was done when the dams were put in, we can't change that fact, but how can the environmentalists and the Indians justify the killing of a ecosystem here now, and the destruction of their own county,” Walden wrote. “Sorry, we all live here, it's not always about you.”
-----
Let me repeat:
Enough already.
Tell Pacific Corp to take down the dams.
Pacific Corp is owned by MidAmerica, a consolidated subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway.
Please call CEO, David L. Sokol. He can be reached at 515.242.4300, ask to speak to Mr. Sokol's personal secretary, Babs
or email her at: btracy at midamerican.com
or write to: David Sokol MidAmerica P.O. Box 657, Des Moines, IA 50303-0657
Make it clear that no other alternative will be acceptable. The dams on the Klamath must come down. Lets do this for the salmon and for our children and their children, and lets do this in memory of Tim McKay.
Tell him we are not going away.
--
http://www.pelicannetwork.net/krc.dammedupperbasin.htm
http://www.klamathforestalliance.org/Newsarticles/newsarticle20051207.html
http://klamathrestoration.org/wp/bring-the-salmon-home-un-dam-the-klamath/
http://www.pcffa.org/klamath.htm
http://www.friendsoftheriver.org/PressRoom/2004-07-06_FOR.html
http://www.democraticleader.house.gov/press/articles.cfm?pressReleaseID=1523
--
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UPDATE: This time the letter to the editor that he wrote was under his own name. Remarkable.
Send your own Buffett appeal
The Times-Standard
Article Launched: 04/24/2007 04:15:23 AM PDT
Klamath River advocates are wise to bring their plea for river restoration, through dam removal, directly to Warren Buffett and his shareholders. John Driscoll gave this story excellent coverage in his cover article of April 18, and the Times Standard wrote a compelling editorial the next day, in support of this action.
Each of us as citizens of the North Coast can further support this effort by showering Mr. Buffett with letters, e-mails and phone calls, encouraging him to give the representatives who are traveling to Omaha his full attention and to meet with them personally, so that he may better understand the gravity and complexity of the impact his dams have on our river, our fishery and our community.
Please take a moment to write to: Warren E. Buffett, c/o Berkshire Hathaway, 3555 Farnam St., Omaha, NE 68131. E-mail dcray@brka.com, or leave a personal message for him at 402-346-1400.
Richard Salzman
Bayside
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